Guild Wars 2

Anet is always biased against Mesmers and love the thieves, look at how quickly they fix the “reveal on miss” bug. Freaking unbelievable. When thieves cry loud enough, they give them love and shift the nerf to Mesmers.

Confusing Combatants is also nerfed, application for confusion on mesmers are back to what we had again.
Engineers, warriors can get 4-5 stacks in one attack or trait.

Mrbig.8019:

Phaeton.9582:

It’s a bug. Too bad for ppl that only want to play d/p tonight.

A bug in the right direction

but given the past history of Anet’s infatuation for thief class, they probably will fix this “bug” due to all the crying, even with all the insane buffs the class received in this patch.

Over at the PvP forum, many are saying every class has builds that do insane dmg, I doubt the current skills will stay this way for long…

NeXeD.3042:

Sounds like it’s a step in the right direction.

no, it IS the step in the right direction, and hopefully Anet will not give into Thieves crying and moaning.

Alphard.6529:

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

Not trying to understand people’s outrage over this issue, and mocking them, does not aid the discussion in any constructive way, and makes you look a bit silly.

Veteran players asking to get a separate base game key because they think the product somehow entitles them to that are silly. Giving out millions of base GW2 accounts to people who upgrade their current account would also be pretty silly.

But screwing the veteran players with their current pricing plan for pre-purchase is beyond silly, what happen to the common business practice of rewarding your loyal customers?

XeoShock.7094:

You miss the point where new players pay $50 for core + xpac and existing players pay $50 for just xpac, some of us have only played for just over a month and been misled with false advertising regardless.

Exactly. Not to mention there are many businesses that have loyalty program for loyal customers, and in this scenario, there’s none for veteran players of the game. The least the can do is include a character slot with the introduction of the Revenant class, that would actually make the price of $50 easy to swallow for community.

Look at the fiasco with the pre-purchase of HOT expansion, it’s pretty obviously you cant trust them.

already has zerk set, will decide on a condi set once all the new changes are in.

Having too set is probably the most ideal situation if your main is a Mesmer, imo…

style.6173:

rchu.8945:

Nyx.7342:

who wins the balance? engies. Already really strong and enjoyable, now more strong and interesting. Friend told me about 6 months ago that the balance devs were ahem, not smart about changes and turns out even tho i didnt believe him then, i believe him now. Movement changes, buffs to already really strong classes….its like wtf are they doing.

But props on mesmer changes

Mesmer changes look good on paper, but let’s not forget Anet gave even more love to thieves. In the end, Mesmers still going to be suboptimal, and not really inclusive in the meta classes because thieves will still own them.

Engineers didnt need any buffs, the lock-on trait should be given to more classes, such as Mesmer that has a hard time against thieves.

Mesmer and engi received the biggest buffs in the game. Shatter is going to be insane.

still cant compete against Thief for a meta spot, so Mesmer remains borderline irrelevant. Thief’s buffs just made them even better at its role, and more effective in killing Mesmers.

Nyx.7342:

who wins the balance? engies. Already really strong and enjoyable, now more strong and interesting. Friend told me about 6 months ago that the balance devs were ahem, not smart about changes and turns out even tho i didnt believe him then, i believe him now. Movement changes, buffs to already really strong classes….its like wtf are they doing.

But props on mesmer changes

Mesmer changes look good on paper, but let’s not forget Anet gave even more love to thieves. In the end, Mesmers still going to be suboptimal, and not really inclusive in the meta classes because thieves will still own them.

Engineers didnt need any buffs, the lock-on trait should be given to more classes, such as Mesmer that has a hard time against thieves.

Shadow of Azrael.1205:

Noone talked about meta heals, besides meta will change in 1 week.

And I have played every class, my first main character in gw2 was an engineer, lol.

sure, you played every class, but we’re pretty sure your main pvp toon is a thief, hence the defense for withdraw nerf, in comparison to other classes healing skills.

I am so sick of thieves being Mesmer’s hard counter. I wish Anet gave Mesmer the “lock-on” trait that Engineers got.

Laraley.7695:

rchu.8945:

Murmaider.1805:

Thief here, I went onto the Thief forums and was lucky enough to have a floaty to swim around in the tears. I don’t get it, I’m excited. I’m hoping these changes get the fotm profession hoppers off of thief, so I can continue to enjoy the profession I chose since beta.

why are the thieves crying? Clearly Mesmers got the the most buffs, and yet Thieves will still eat them alive. If anything, Mesmers should still be crying because with the buffs they are still hard countered by the the same popular thief class.

What about the other zerker specs that will be eaten alive by mesmers?

I honestly dont care about other zerker classes, it’s been so long Mesmer is part of meta, if it does happen this time I will enjoy it to the fullest.

Argilla.8340:

Honestly, it took 2 years to rebalance this game and all youre doing is destroying all the balance you had over this time

Just think logicly for a second, this won’t benefit anyone

I am glad this is happening, the classes I play the most are not part of the meta, so I am glad there is a chance to “reset” and let see how things play out.

The people that are crying because their mains are part of the meta, that’s just too bad.

Zenith.7301:

What most mesmers are ignorant of here are the thief changes. Not only id thief damage get buffed further with new critical strike traits…

17% extra critical damage with new traits. Ferocity from 10% of precision. They’re looking at close to a 25%+ critical damage boost from new traits.

Shadow Arts will be really stupid. Their health regen and initiative while stealthed has been merged, they take 25% less damage while stealthed, condi removal on stealth, 3 sec stealth on steal so they get a free backstab when they steal now.

On top of reduced steal recharge and longer steal range.

And this is for 1v1 purposes. If the thief wants to go full nuke, he’ll drop shadow arts and go trickery and sit on a 12% damage increase from full initiative.

S/D gets even worse since they made the buff to flanking strike baseline.

Thief damage is gonna go up the roof this balance patch and I’m betting a lot of people are totally clueless until the patch hits and they start feeling those backstabs on steroids.

exactly, I dont know why people think Mesmers are better than Thieves after the changes kick in. Anet just has a kitten for the thief class, and they insist it to be the hard-counter to Mesmer class no matter what.

Murmaider.1805:

Thief here, I went onto the Thief forums and was lucky enough to have a floaty to swim around in the tears. I don’t get it, I’m excited. I’m hoping these changes get the fotm profession hoppers off of thief, so I can continue to enjoy the profession I chose since beta.

why are the thieves crying? Clearly Mesmers got the the most buffs, and yet Thieves will still eat them alive. If anything, Mesmers should still be crying because with the buffs they are still hard countered by the the same popular thief class.

Sebrent.3625:

Morfedel, it’s now about “can you beat a Thief”. It’s about “can you beat an equal (or better) skilled Thief?” as that is going to be the challenge in team game.

If you can’t, then there is really no reason for your team to have you as you’re a liability. As I previously stated, a Thief can already +1 faster than you due to greater mobility.

So, if you can’t when the encounters over the Thief, you aren’t providing any advantage.

Your team can still win, but the advantage won’t be coming from you. You are thief bait which makes you a liability and puts them at a disadvantage that the other 4 members have to now make up for.

exactly.

If the trait revamp and specialization is not able to balance this issue, Mesmers will NEVER be meta in PvP going forward, because thieves will always be part of team in 5 vs. 5 composition.

Lordrosicky.5813:

420 posts and counting. That is all the evidence you need that OP was right and that stealth needs more counter play to it. If it wasn’t an issue thieves wouldn’t care if it got nerfed and other classes wouldn’t care. The fact this thread has so much interest is conclusive proof that nerfs are needed.

Job done, well done all.

agree 100%, my main is a Mesmer, and I dont care if they remove stealth. Initiative system + stealth is not balanced at all.

MSFone.3026:

This thread is just horrible. This is how MMO’s die, these little things like moa on a lich that people complain about are really a key part of the spice of the game. Things slowly get dulled into blandness, all the weird annoying things that make the game unique get removed, and all the classes start to get the abilities of others.

Oh no my ability has a counter! Dude if you play mesmer at all just go make a thread asking for thieves attacks to not work on us because that class hard counters our entire class.

Lich form is a big dumb i-win button and when you press it you should have some chance of getting turned into a big dumb bird. All abilities that read “hit this and turn into a big super monster with boring abilities and high dmg!” are stupid and each should have an annoying counter.

And before anyone calls moa and I-win button, getting moa’ed gives you a free super escape. I never die when moa, ever, just turn around and hit the sprint and keep running. Congrats, you have just countered moa. moa is a cc, that’s it and the only people who die to it are clueless.

People spank it over counter play so hard in this game, and yet that one principle seemingly so important is constantly violated, ignored or desired to have another special exemption added to it.

well said

nightblood.7910:

Not to mention the coming changes of Hard to Catch + Dont Stop and Swiftness on Dodge. Its going to be pretty much the end of the PBS+RF combo against a thief, if it ever was a problem to begin with.

Which is why I stopped fussing about PBS and Skyhammer, as being PBS while jumping up on a platform using the jumping things of which you cant use asy skills while in the air to counter gets you knocked off the map. The fix is coming for at least thieves.

all classes are getting new stuff, what makes you think rangers wouldn’t have something better to handle thieves?

Nilix.2170:

Nocturnal Lunacy.8563:

First of all people the Revenant is not meant to be a major damage dealer. It’s a tank and therefore does low damage like a tank does. That’s why they are full celestial. Get your heads out of the stupid meta crap and think.

Everyone was full celestial in the beta. Everyone.

One of the reply someone mentioned when switched to a guardian he did more dmg than Revenant, NOW that I am concern with.

TyPin.9860:

I agree with StickerHappy here.

And @phokus:
When you are in Lich form, there is no counter to Moa but dodge. But dodge counters everything, so that doesn’t really count. I do not advocate that Moa changes as a whole, only when you Moa a transformed target, such as Necro in Lich form, you don’t turn the Lich into Moa, but back into a normal necro.

Even plague, which is a transfrom with blinds, can be easily Moad by going beyond the the PAoE range of plague.

sure, if they lower the CD of Moa to 45 sec… Heck, 30 sec, then I will agree.

LumAnth.5124:

Another thing, Chill is probably one of the most detrimental conditions on classes with little condition removal (Mesmer….). They also have constant application of stability in the new death shroud. Yeah their sluggish, but they have great stability and constant chill.

Mesmer’s will be getting much improved condition removal in HOT… Mesmers can now take Shattered Conditions and Mender’s Purity without totally wrecking our shatter effectiveness (loss of IP). Chronomancer has the awesome Time Marches trait that helps combat this soft CC.

But back on topic, I agree with OP, it seems reaper hit the homerun on coolness, but I dont think it does much for the necro class as a whole. Did the necro community really wanted a melee based specialization to enhance the class?

Warrior specialization will be Battle Mage.

New MH weapon will be scepter.

EremiteAngel.9765:

well like I said, don’t let me see you guys cry for necro nerfs when we meet in HoT

We dont hate necros, we hate thieves

StickerHappy.8052:

Reaper looks so cool imo, not gonna lie.

And also, not sure about the lockdown mesmer part, too early too use, hell half of the traits aren’t even released yet.

+1

Reaper looks cool as hell. Sorry to OP, but I have to disagree, Reaper is way cooler than Chronomancer (even the name sounds better).

Titus.2085:

Haha! This thread’s interesting!

I’ll put my two cents here:

I don’t give a kitten about what the other classes say about the Mesmer 2.0 or the Chronomancer! We NEED that buff because for two whole years, we have been the butt of every joke in every environment (PvP, WvW, PvE)! We needed the buffs and thank God for those. Now every mesmer can be releveant in every meta and we get more build choices and more build diversity that comes long with it. It’s beautiful!

woah, let’s not jump to conclusion, given how Anet has treated Mesmers for 2 years, what makes you think all of a sudden Mesmers are viable in all aspects of the game.

I will believe when it actually happens (and stays relevant with no nerf bats).

Arantheal.7396:

Nilix.2170:

They were glad turrets were now useless and that overnight, they had vanished from ranked play. What frustrates me so much about this attitude is that it’s entirely selfish as opposed to looking at the bigger picture of how a profession and its skills function. I regularly hear about how turret engineers and the fact they are AI controlled is unfair and yet a mesmer differs little in the sense that Phantasm’s are also AI controlled damage. The only difference being that a Phantasm’s damage is higher than any turret, lower in cooldown, can be shattered and you don’t sacrifice any utility for having them. Oh, and unlike a turret, they can follow you.

Has he been reading my posts? Can this guy just come here and high five me?

What the kitten is this guy rambaling about phantasms?
Did he even play mesmer to begin with?
Phantasms are extremely squishy, actually even more squishy than the current turret iteration. Phantasms will not move with you, but use their skills only on the target they got summoned upon. If that target dies, they despawn instantly, making it not possible to take them with you into the next fight.
Phantasms are nothing but short-lasting dps beacons that the mesmer has literally no control about, except which effect he gains by shattering them.
Clones do not even do any dmg. The only ones that have offensive capabilities are those from staff, because they spam the staff AA (for next to 0 dmg) but apply full-hitting conditions. They blow up from single attacks, take condis and again, can not be controlled further than to decide when, how & where to die.
If you want to kitten up mesmer-rotations, aoe-spam the area so their clones and phantasms have no chance to stay up. If your enemy runs clone-death, make sure to not be in melee to clones when they die.
Remember APT? It’s also not a good idea to be in melee when a turret goes down.

The last patch just got turrets in line with clones/phantasms, necro-minions, spirits and spirit weapons. What this guy is writing there in his post is nothing but another rambling about a easy-mode, OP spec being gone from the game.
But lets look into other builds that used turrets before. Are they impacted by this?

Decap with thumper. Nope, still a double knockback-beacon that lives long enough to get its knockbacks trough.
S/D with rifle turret. Nope, the toolbelt is untouched by the changes, and the turret itself still can be used as instant knock-back and blast-finisher.
S/D with rocket-turret. Nope, the overcharge still fires instantly, it still can be used as instant knockback & blast-finisher, and the toolbelt remained untouched
Nades with net-turret. Nope, net turret still fires instantly before it gets destroyed, getting his 2sec stun and immob trough. again, insta-knockback and blast-finsiher work like intended, as well as the toolbelt.
FT / FT – the high uptime of flame-turret this build required is definitively not possible anymore, but it lasts long enough to get the smokefield pulsing to its end, and the firefield on the TB is still awesome utility. So this received a nerf in burning uptime, still you get your awesome knockback and blast-finisher on low cd.
HT in all builds: the combo remains untouched and that’s waht made it awesome in the first place.
Supply-crate in all builds: all turrets die faster, but the immob from the net-turret still comes trough, as well as a couple of burning ticks. together with all the bandaids and 2sec aoe ranged stun, this skill is almost as awesome as before.

The only specs that got hit hard by this nerf are 2-3 turret specs. And it’s good that they are gone, imo. And since our other build-options just got influenced on minor proportions, literally nothing of value was lost.

agree 100%, that writer is a waste of oxygen comparing turrets to phantasm.

Vizardlorde.8243:

Pve yes, Pvp hell no!

Mesmer in HOT will still be a lackluster PvE class, and in PvP there are better stuff to slot than wells. So “no way in hell” for me to use them in any aspects of the game.

StickerHappy.8052:

MailMail.6534:

Every profession reveal should have been hosted on Ready-Up, NOT Points of Interest. At least they corrected their mistake. You give Rubi much too much hate…

You’re being a bit dramatic though. They went through all of our utilities, the other shield skill and the new Continuum Shift shatter in addition to 2 traits with hints at even more traits.

Guess what? the next specialization feature is POI again. LOL.

Same with the guardian, did 5 weapon skills, all traits which is 12 traits total, all the utilities, sample builds, the elite, the new virtues. Im not blaming her entirely, she couldve just showed our feature a little bit more of love.

writing is on wall, people just need to be mentally prepared when HOT comes, Mesmer might still not get much love from the devs. It’s really too bad that such a unique and iconic class is not being treated with more attention compare to other classes.

Sebrent.3625:

As I said before … they’re likely going to rub the salt right back in our eyes after the stream (I can’t watch twitch from work).

Guardian has been one of the dominant classes in the meta for WvW, sPvP, and PvE. Not once have I seen someone go “oh crap, we have a Guardian in our party”.

It is that class that can facetank in a game where most people that facetank die horrible, disfiguring deaths … one of the very reasons I love being on my Mesmer so I can strip most of that BS from them so they can either “not play like crap” or “just die” (I hate extremely effective low skill floors … so love “correcting” them).

There should be no surprise that its new Specialization is powerful.

I just think Guardian as a class is in a good spot, not OP in the meta, killable, but not so weak against most builds. As for low skill floor, that’s kind of subjective. The only one I can think of that are way worst is pew pew ranger and turret engies, and we all know what just happened to turret engies…

I just hope Anet address the skill vs. reward for Mesmer, I just dont want to deal with thieves as a hard counter even if you played well, and you still get destroyed by them on most cases.

Laraley.7695:

Jermoe Morrow.9501:

I think the real question is who were these scrub lords who were defeated by turret engies pre-nerf who could just sit amongst there turret and not die? Whenever I ran turret and got in a fight, I would find myself quickly with all skills on cool down and an empty stamina bar (and those were the fights I won). Turret engie certainly wasn’t a super hard build, but it wasn’t mindless, and it certainly wasn’t particularly devastating to anyone with an IQ above 70.

Now I am going to have to struggle to find a use for turrets, since no amount of placement is going to keep a flame or thumper from being a wasted skill slot now. I guess rifle is still good for its toolbelt in a static discharge if nothing else. If only we could do boons…then perhaps team up with a ranger using healing spring…

Kittening noobs, always ruining the game crying for nerfs instead of learning to play…

It’s really funny when the used to be turret engis call other players noobs.

lol.

+1000

naphack.9346:

Butter.3024:

If you look at League, they got a balance patches that pretty much completely shift the meta every 3 weeks, and it keeps people on their toes, keep the matches fresh and not repetitive.

You mean, they nerf currently played heroes(sorry, champions) and buff underplayed ones, so they can sell more heroes champions.
That’s just switching around what narrow selection of heroes champions the players are supposed to play.
Doesn’t sound like balance to me. More like a business model.

sure, I dont mind as long as each class gets a chance to be IN the meta. Mesmers, Necros and Rangers need a balance patch.

Laraley.7695:

Thief and mesmer. They’re getting huge buffs and don’t think they’ll be out of meta any soon.

Mesmer is in the current meta? LOL…

Jackums.3496:

I’m a Mesmer and I disagree.

“The enemy of my enemy is my friend.”

haha.

+1

Windwalker.7421:

Quadox.7834:

serenke.4806:

We’ve gotten shield and a lame name (granted “dragon hunter” is even lamer).
On paper our spec. looks at least more fun than the guard’s.
We’re not much better off than them though.

How is chronomancer a lame name?

Yeah! No kidding!

It’s certainly leaps and bounds better then Dragon Hunter on a virtue/justice based Paladin-like class. Check Google Images for “Dragon Hunter” and you get the answer to what most-people think of when they hear that term. I don’t see a lot of that looking like your fairy-winged do-gooder in that video! ;-)

Not to mention that a bow doesn’t really fit that theme either. A big-kitten crossbow maybe, but not a plain Longbow. Ever hear of a LB taking down a dragon? I mean Bard tried it, and saw where that got him! Didn’t do squat until he broke the bow in half, turned it into a ballista MacGyver style, and shot a big heavy dwarven arrow in just the one weak spot the dragon had! Sounds to me like Guardians should have gotten 2h lances. :P

Chronomancer not only sounds good, but fits the Mesmer perfectly. (And GI agrees! )

How does chronomancer fit perfectly with Mesmer?

And what’s with all the knocks against guards? Personally I am having more fun with my guard in PvP than Mesmer, at least I feel like I have a shot against most classes / builds, and I dont think that will change much in HoT. Sure, the fashion is cool, but dying in fabulous clothes to thieves constantly is no fun. All that glitters is not gold, we shall see how Mesmers fare in PvP in HOT expansion. Let’s not forget about PvE concerns (plenty new threads about it), the new traits and specialization is not helping the Mesmer in that aspect of the game either…

Windwalker.7421:

Noha.3749:

Lets see how well it does compared to the not yet revealed specializations of the other professions. Hopefully its good enough in comparison!

By no means am i trying to spank the hype on the funny parts, but im a realist and i cant celebrate yet due to the fog of mystery ahead of us.

Who knows if thieves gets Death Shroud and Rangers longbow range.. Joke aside.

True enough, but I try not to fall prey to the “grass is greener” mentality whenever I see what goodies other professions are getting. The changes we’re seeing are so substantial, with so many new and exciting traits & abilities, that no matter what others are getting, there is no reason to be negative about anything at this point.

Until it’s played of course, and if then we find out we’re worse off then others, then I’ll whine right along with the rest of Mesmers! I just don’t think it’s possible to judge balance on paper with such a huge patch.

So far the glass is half full!

you’re right, you cant judge balance on paper, but we certainly can judge based on past actions from Anet. Mesmers were repeatedly nerfed for a very long time due to other classes whining and kittening, so to say that ANet will be more sympathetic to Mesmers is kind of naive. The developer that presented the Chromancer is Robert Gee, someone I’ve never heard before compare to the more recognized dev names on the forum. Yea, I have my doubts, a “nobody important” dev is working on Mesmer HOT specialization, nice…

Ashern.5328:

rchu.8945:

Please share some of your ranked PvP videos, especially against good thieves.

I haven’t ever recorded my fights. I will say though that thieves with Withdraw + Roll For Initiative + S/D can give me a hard time since they’ll be evading 80% of the battle. D/P is another annoyance with the blind, but I’ve slightly learned how to handle most of those situations…

what you mean by “slightly learned” when it comes to thieves? Are you saying that it’s still work in progress in getting better against them, or it took you a short time to learn how to deal with.

I dont mean to badger you, but the general sentiment shared by many (including top Mesmer players in high level PvP tournaments) is that an equally skilled thief against Mesmer on the same skill level the advantage is heavily in favor of the thief. I just dont want the new players get the wrong info on the reality of Mesmer in the current state of the game, because it’s not that great, to say the least.

Ashern.5328:

Ignore what everyone else says about Mesmers being bad or not good for beginners. When I first started truly pvping, Mesmer was the first one I chose and was also the first Champion title I achieved. To this day, my Mesmer still has more wins than all other other 7 classes’ wins combined. I played Engi for a while and still do and it’s the only one that came close to the amount of wins as my mes.

If you learn what to and not to do; where and where not to place your phantasms; who you can and cannot fight; it will allow you to be a great Mesmer. Thieves are no longer a “hard counter” for me, they are actually quite easy because now when I see a thief on other team, I mentally prepare myself. Expect at any moment to be hit by about half your health snatched, stunned, and possibly immobilized as well.

Most thieves see you’re a squishy class and think it’s a free win. If you’re quick on the draw, it doesn’t take long to use a stun break right after they first hit you, stealth and then set up your phantasms. Most thieves can’t actually sustain in a head to head fight and will die soon after.

Most of them have the same pattern and once you learn it, it’s easy to avoid it. Half the time you get caught off guard, it’s still possible to recover and win (just depends how far your brain was wandering at the point of getting ganked).

One word of advice, don’t be the person that “plays easy classes to get a hang of the game.” If you like a class, I suggest you play it and learn it. “Easy” classes are cheap and they may be effective in most cases, but they still are, in my eyes, lame when everyone and their mamas are using it just because it’s easy. (No offense to mamas)

I was a bad Mesmer at first until I fought a guild member that was playing very well and I learned how to use the environment to my advantage. Mesmers can’t always fight well on a point (unless they’re condi perhaps but all the going invis may eventually lose them the point they’re on) but they sure can make someone else run off of it.

NecroN.8306:

denis.9487:

Mesmer rocks. Just start small. Ignore the people that say shatter or die. Ease into the class with forgiving specs such as condition pu move to power pu. Then gradually change over pieces to become a bursty spec in pvp/wvw. Mesmer is a boss class. Become feared on your wvw home world!!

Now I know you’re tolling.. No one and I mean NO ONE fears a Mesmer..

Seriously other classes can accomplish what a Mesmer can do in half the time with minimal deaths, but if you like pain with little reward then the Mesmer class is for you. I would not start any crafting or sink gold into soulbounds until you truly think this trash class is for you.. Oh and get used to being kicked from groups just because of your class.. (got a portal?). I would try other classes just to compare and you will see for yourself.

Oh LOOK OUT!!! Here comes NecroN’s Mesmer.. Haahaa OMG thats a good one… Thanks I needed that laugh.

That made me laugh pretty hard (not really). I’m assuming everything you’re talking about is in PvE because in PvP, a good mesmer can do what other classes can do “in half the time.” All classes serve purposes and just because another class —- no, build — can do something quicker doesn’t mean it’s better.

In PvE, mesmers may not deal a lot of damage compared to wars/thieves/eles, but they also have much more utility. A heck of a lot of condi cleanse for the whole party, boon removal for many mobs or bosses that may have some annoying boon on, and not to mention quickly rotated reflects. Defiance removal, CCing and hello! Time warp?

Any party that kicks you because you’re a Mesmer are either mentally kittened or only sees ZERKER ZERKER MAX DAMAGE as the only way to play through a fricken dungeon. While they’re at it, I’ll bet they wiped 3 times in the process.

Don’t let anyone tell you that a Mesmer isn’t good unless it’s a specific situation where you can judge for yourself whether or not they are not exactly beneficial to certain places. Don’t let anyone tell you anything bad about a class until you experience it yourself and find out for yourself. Most people that claim things are bad are people that look at “all the pros” and think that only meta builds or classes work. Those are people you should feel sorry for.

Please share some of your ranked PvP videos, especially against good thieves.

Sebrent.3625:

Korusef.3714:

So will Thieves get Quickness through Plasma now as well?

Given that they can trait to get two uses out of whatever they steal … I certainly hope not … I hope that Plasma exits the game. Getting two doses of every boon in the game every time they steal from me (~21s) doesn’t sound like a fun time … if you’re an interrupt build … even worse since they’d have stability … and becomes even worse if they take Acrobatics given that every 30s it will stunbreak them and refill endurance.

That could be a bigger pain in the butt than what we currently deal with.

my money is on Thieves will continue to destroy Mesmers in HOT.

data.4093:

Arshay Duskbrow.1306:

So instead of giving us rifles, we get yet another offhand, bring us up to five, with only two mainhands, only one of which is actually viable. Not because shield made sense from a mechanics standpoint, mind, but because it was “thematically appropriate”. Or in other words, they sacrificed giving us five completely new weapon skills for the sake of flavor.

Mesmer is a very squishy class and shield seems to be offering support/defense abilities, it’s very appropriate mechanically. Why would mesmers want/need rifle? It wouldn’t fit. Mesmers have ranged weapons so rifle would be out of place unless it became melee(?).

even with shield and the new skills, thieves will still eat us for breakfast, lunch and dinner in PvP and WvW…

Carighan.6758:

rchu.8945:

sorry, still not buying your defense. As far as I know, I dont know this “Robert Gee” guy that presented the Chronomancer. All the other devs that we are familiar dont main a Mesmer. If Mr. Robert Gee is such a important figure, where da heck was he for the past 1+ years when Mesmer got constantly nerfs after nerfs?

Why would it be important (or even helpful) if a dev mains a Mesmer, as far as power is concerned?
My example was exactly that the lead developer for WoW mained one of the consistently weakest specs in the game.

And it makes sense, in a way. If you’re playing class X in your leisure time, chances are that if you were to start work on their balance more than on anyone else’s, your colleagues would be annoyed that you’re doing personal favors. I reckon your boss wouldn’t much like that, either.
So if anything ,you update your class last (or you just don’t consider classes any different in the first place).

It’s also a stupid assumption: “Hey, we don’t really understand what makes a dev focus or not focus onto our class, it has to be personal favorites though! That has to be it!”
To compare, people didn’t really understand lightning and thunder back in the days, so it was Odin and Thor, gods causing these effects. But that was ofc wrong, as we found out later. Likewise, it’s quite unlikely that a dev is sitting there happily thinking up new ways to screw over a specific class out of personal spite. It’s much more likely that a mix of limited resources, class complexity, planned changes later on and money considerations prioritize classes and balance for you.

But then, no one wants to hear that, do they?

to your point, is this Robert Gee a lead developer for GW2? Up until Chronomancer info has been posted, I have never seen his name before. To me it is important if a lead dev plays Mersmer because you can assume the dev will understand the pluses and minuses of the class. Sorry to be a negative nancy here, but my whole take on the Chronomancer and other new traits for Mesmer is simply be measured against the hard-counter class (or classes) that Mesmer currently (and will) have. It doesn’t matter how good they are if other classes have better stuff to use against Mesmer. If Mesmer continue to need other PvP team members to peel for them, and be hard countered by popular classes with no weapon cooldown in Thieves and Revenants, it’s pointless to play Mesmer in PvP.

Rym.1469:

There will be no sacraficing with elite specialization.

From what we’ve seen, they only add to existing profession, without trade offs. So every Mesmer will be a Chronomancer as long as he can give up on one of base trait lines.

That’s what many feared. Vanilla specs non-existant, you choose between specializations. And since we’ll get only one specialization in HoT, there’s no choice yet.

To suck or not to suck.

Actually there’s a lot of sacrifice for Mesmers, allow me to quote someone from the Mesmer’s community:

Fay.2357:

Let’s start with interrupt builds. Standard interrupt will probably be domination, dueling, and chaos. Chaos gives the strong CI/BI effects, along with good staff boosts. Dueling has the incredible pistol trait, along with standard DE for clone generation and other utility stuff. Domination has the amazing reworked CS, along with the power block + upgraded halting strike trait. This a really well-working, strong build. Now, to take chrono, you’d have to sacrifice some of that. You could…but it would be a significant sacrifice. From what we know of chrono, some stuff is comparable to stuff from other traitlines. This makes that sacrifice a viable option, but absolutely not the single best one.

Alright, now lets do power shatter builds. Power shatter is domination, dueling, and illusions. You’d have to sacrifice one for chrono. Domination has incredible damgae amp. Dueling has DE. Illusions has the powerful shatter cooldowns + shatter boosting traits. Chrono might be worth dropping one of those for…but it’ll be a big sacrifice. One that some people might take, but is definitely not the single best choice.

Now lets look at condie shatter. Condie shatter is generally going to be dueling, chaos, and illusions. This is a really strong set, with dueling providing conditions on crit plus DE, chaos giving staff traits and PU, and illusions providing Maim. One of these must be sacrificed for chrono. Again, maybe you could sacrifice chaos, maybe dueling…but it’s a hard choice. One that some people might take, but definitely not the single best choice.

I could do this for phantasm builds, mantra builds, literally any standard build archetype….I could do this same analysis for.

Conclusion
Chrono is an interesting specialization, has some strong utilities, useful traits…and is absolutely not going to be the only option.

Carighan.6758:

Doam.8305:

Must not play many MMO’s

It’s a completely reasonable assumption heck WoW is widely known for there FOTM classes.

Oh, and this indicates that devs have “favorite” and “disliked” classes/specs?

See, it’s funny that you bring up WoW. The game established this trend of bashing the devs for seemingly giving additional attention and/or power to classes or specs based on their personal preference.

As in, “Ghostcrawler plays XYZ”.

Funny story there, when he left he finally was allowed to talk about what he played personally, his main was a Holy Priest ever since day 1 of his position. One of the consistently weakest specs in the game.

And the lesson is, devs would risk their jobs pulling personal favorites. Plus it’s more effort than not doing so. Why should they do it? O.o

sorry, still not buying your defense. As far as I know, I dont know this “Robert Gee” guy that presented the Chronomancer. All the other devs that we are familiar dont main a Mesmer. If Mr. Robert Gee is such a important figure, where da heck was he for the past 1+ years when Mesmer got constantly nerfs after nerfs?

Chaos Archangel.5071:

Continuum Shift (F5 estimated 80s+ CD) allows us to shatter our illusions to “displace” us from time. This effect allows us to cast freely, eat damage, and do whatever we want in an assumed 1-4 seconds until the effect ends, which then we’ll be reset to whatever state we were in before shattering, cooldowns/health reset and all.

This means we can literally use any skill(s) twice.

Alacrity is a new Chronomancer-specific resource that allows us to lower the cooldowns of our abilities. Mostly trait-focused, Alacrity works on Mesmers, their illusions, and even can be shared to allies in limited form. Alacrity will be gained through shatters, but it is hinted that there will be other ways to gain/grant it. ( Assuming interrupts, Phantasm summons, and on … Mantra charge? )

It is assumed this was the “something just as good” that was hinted before to make up for us only receiving an offhand. Are you happy with this or would you rather have gotten a new weapon besides shield?

skilled thieves can still hide in stealth while we are in this mode (and SA thief has a 50% damage reduction in HOT), and the duration is too short. This is a perfect sell job by Anet, Alacrity is overrated and thieves will still eat Mesmers all day long.

Personally I prefer a new main hand weapon for Mesmer.

Mikkel.8427:

I think everyone is looking at this the wrong way… Specializations are supposed to give us access to an additional weapon (we all know this part), BUT every other class is getting either a main hand or 2-handed weapon (so far that i know). so, I’m pretty sure the F5 shatter is intended to be the “something just as good” to make our specialization competitive with all of the other classes. If we had to give up something additional for it, it really wouldn’t be ‘just as good’.

You guys are comparing our base specializations with our only elite at this time instead of comparing it with what the other classes will be getting. There is a reason we will only be able to equip one elite at a time- its intended to make an impact on the way you play. That does not make it better than the base specializations though… that’s silly to suggest.

You are assuming what Anet is selling to Mesmer is “just as good” as what other classes are getting, frankly I have my doubts. I think Fay pointed out in his (or her) detailed posts already, those are very valid concerns for Mesmers in HOT.

apharma.3741:

The trade off is as Fay said so I won’t repeat her words.

However if you’re looking for a more obvious one, you just used continuum rift in the middle of a fight, mortar engy, ele, guardian and warrior just accidentally cleaved out your sprite and rendered your specialisation mechanic worthless. This is without mentioning the revenant who will most likely get a trait for killing anything that isn’t a revenant in 1500 range, instantly.

There’s just too much AoE and cleave in this game for squishy things like sprites and illusions. I remember doing some dealing against a zerk GS warrior and he just massacred all my clones in one hit. An entire class mechanic rendered useless by an auto attack, just glad he didn’t use axe!

Oh and by the way, did you miss the part where a SA thief gets a minor trait for 50% damage reduction in stealth? I’m far more concerned about that than anything shown about the chronomancer. SA thieves are a plague atm and it’s just getting worse.

SA thieves get a 50% damage in reduction in stealth? Wow.

With Thieves and revenants have no weapon cooldowns and with our new traits that could affect cooldown, Anet already added another class that could be Mesmer’s hard counter. With other classes getting good improvements as well, I dont see Mesmer moving back into the meta…

Caelus.7139:

rchu.8945:

if the new skills and traits allow Mesmer to become not hard-countered by thieves, sure I guess I will be happy. But I doubt it would be the case. Thieves might even able to steal alacrity and completely destroy us, as is the case now.

Alacrity isn’t a boon according to the devs. Although I hope I’m right that they can’t steal it..

I hope not either, but there’s a counter to alacrity such as chill, not sure how many other classes will be able to apply chill. What I mean is, this first reveal of Mesmers specialization is cool, but if other meta classes/builds will have access to chill and other goodies, it really does nothing to put Mesmers back into the meta, we are just stuck in the same place because other classes got great stuff too.

Quadox.7834:

Menaka.5092:

Xaylin.1860:

Menaka.5092:

it’s very late, but…

• chronomancer spec has shield with an area effect that stuns and has access to ground-targeted AoE that inflicts slow and chill – and maybe more goodies in the traitline
• weakness on interrupt on domination spec
• PBAoE blind on shatter on dueling (iirc) spec
• chaos armor granting protection in chaos spec

All fancy and stuff, but…

• Slow and Chill have aren’t that effective against Thieves. Why? Because ANet.
• PB 2.0 is nice but interrupt builds aren’t that particularly good against Thieves.
• Blinds are nice. But we all know that Thieves will just stab a second time.
• S/D Thieves (or anyone with Trickery) will say ‘Thank you!’ for the extra Protection.

Not meaning to be too pessimistic here. We don’t know about new traits yet and there also might be changes to existing skills. But so far I haven’t seen anyhting which makes me think that Thieves will have a hard time against it.

how are Slow and Chill not effective on thieves? :\
also, you seem to dismiss the fact that wells are a damage source that we can apply to either create an area that thieves will try to avoid or just to apply damage to them even if we cannot target them

Chill slows cooldowns, doesn’t work on thief. Slow should work okay.

yep, same as the current version of power block, because the initiative system that Thieves have, they technically have no weapon cool down. This mean Revenants will also not be affected because the energy system. That pretty much have the affect of adding another class that can “own” Mesmers in HOT, no matter how good the new traits are.

data.4093:

EremiteAngel.9765:

…i think its a matter of learning to play.

Nah not really. That’s always a factor but even against aware mesmers, thieves can simply wear them out. The S/D will burn burst options rather quickly, openings don’t really exist unless the thief gives them to you or you luckily stun them twice. Immobilize does nothing to S/D. D/P is a more consistent set, thieves can’t dodge everything but carry 2 stun breaks. D/P 3 skill ensures they can stay aggressive in almost any situation. If D/P 3 skill wasn’t unblockable or at the very least didn’t blind then it may be another story but the skill can completely shut down a mesmer and prevent kiting. The only way to escape the aggression is through stealth.

well said, the delusional and ignorant people need to stop saying out the “learn to play” bullkitten. If they are so good, where are they in the top tier PvP tournaments?