Guild Wars 2

GS AA can now be used without canceling for most efficiency, or at least very close. Close enough to make Imagined Burden something I might look at now. Not to say the trait is amazing, but the GS AA issue was a big barrier to entry.

Eagelseye.6312:

^ exactly this is needed. PvP Devs just implement two separate leagues for solo/duoQ ers and full premade Quers and everyone will be happy

Not two separate leagues, two separate ques for the same league as Spartacus said. Should be fair in that if you que as a team you’re facing another pre-made in the same league as those Soloq’ing, assuming MMR is remotely close to fair.

Even doing this is still going to be tough for match frequency for the teams but at least it’s something in having a separate TeamQ from SoloQ and would quell a lot of the debate.

This going to be streamed?

Sigils only function on the mesmer itself, not it’s illusions.

I’d like to say that Anet was concerned the burning intensity/uptime would be a concern due to illusionary elasticity also becoming baseline in the same patch, but that would be giving them way too much credit.

All depends on MMR. This will get torn apart by many current meta builds. Also might stacks should not be a thing with this build with anyone playing a competent mesmer canceling their GS auto. I wish imagined burden worked with this optimal way to play but it doesn’t. For sure mental anguish should be there.

The dom/insp/chrono shatter build that is so popular for folks who actually want to run power shatter and not die instantly (though not meta) is pretty much this build without the signets.

Frostball.9108:

I agree with OP, i think they should also bring back vampirism runes and all the amulets that were removed from pvp, especially minstrel. Im sure we can all agree that way the game will be more fun to play.

Just gonna tack on a big ’ole Kappa to this, just in case.

At the very least, something easy that would help would be to only allow two of the same class in a match.

Protected phantasms should be baseline. 100% garbage. The focus trait should be moved to adept and persisting images baseline since even with the change to illusion death awhile ago, that trait is still sub-par.

If you see a mesmer in a fight you better be watching it over and above any other player for that moa animation if you’re that concerned about being moa’d out of your transform. Other than that, l2p.

messiah.1908:

i have tested it with diviner amulet and boons sharing after fellow mesmer talk about it in other thread i post on support mesmer build

with no FI rather stm was able to share about 12 sec of quickness among all the other boons with shatter spamm

sure i was squishy as hell was able to kill noob ranger meta build 1v1 as i got 18 might stack (built it up) but when rev and thief target me and pugs didnt support me as i asked i got killed in 20 sec (i was surprised)

so i cant take null field so no boon ripping or condi cleanse but i gave more boons
maybe i can take null field instead of blink but than i need kitten good team to support me

FI i think is more selfish trait than to be used to share the quickness

I assume you meant my thread from a week or so ago … and yes that’s exactly the experience, 10-15s of quickness from stm shared passively (not to mention all the protection/stability/might) from illusionary inspiration so you can still take signet of illusions, portal and blink.

Boon rip is extremely underrated from sword AA, especially with perma quickness, null field is not really needed as much. You get a lot more damage and survivability with the signet. Signet means even more boon upkeep from shatters, just feeds the whole concept wonderfully. I might eventually post a vid in that thread to show.

Fay.2357:

skcamow.3527:

Throwing this out there …

I get the history and inconsistency of other phantasm spawns being unable to be evaded, but from a pure game play/counter play perspective, why shouldn’t our phantasm spawns be able to be dodged?

Because they can already be blinded, invulned, and the actual phantasms themselves can be blinded, dodged, invulned, cced, kited, or killed. The skills already have more opportunities and options for counterplay than any other skills in the entire game.

I get it … ultimately Anet needs to be consistent about this. So let’s call bug for now.

Throwing this out there …

I get the history and inconsistency of other phantasm spawns being unable to be evaded, but from a pure game play/counter play perspective, why shouldn’t our phantasm spawns be able to be dodged?

Well said ideas in this thread. Anet is trying so hard; they honestly have released some very good content with HoT and the patches since. I hope they can rebound and knock it out of the park for the second xpac.

And hoping for PvE mesmer/chronomancer to finally experience decent, if not good DPS options.

#herestohoping

The fact is that player MMR has been so mucked up as a result of the first three seasons, coupled with new players getting average MMR. As a result, the full circle back to season 1 MMR is now equally as mucked.

I think the original season one would have been the best (pure ranked MMR at that point) had it not been for the smurfing, legends carrying amber teammates and bunker mesmer issues.

Sadly we can’t get to that now. I truly hope Anet has a good solution in mind for the next iteration of seasons.

NICENIKESHOE.7128:

I know the benefit of shattered concentration is massive. But with the current meta always pulsing boons I feel like I should try something different when I can’t part away from Domination. Been playing around furious interruption with diviner ammy lately and I must say I’m quite surprised by the outcome. 5s quickness on 3s CD, this gives “almost” (as provided that you read boons and know how to interrupt) perma quickness and suddenly a lot of mesmer skills opened up. Phantasmal disenchanter cast time too long? Now its 1s cast time (yeah still bad tbh so I swap between other cleanses). Mantra casting finished within 1.75s which feel a lot less clumsy. Gravity well now becomes 2/3 s cast time so you can stack a lot of damage in team fight when power block delivers.

The synergy between quickness and CS also allows sword to be finally deadly, where blurred frenzy actually land full hit with MoD, so you’re not so predictable in the ever-the-same iLeap/Tides of Time combo. Sword auto can do a lot more damage but again if you find survival is a problem best kite a bit more.

• Been going toe to toe with thieves thanks to MoD and CS.
• You control the match against guardians since you slot BD.
• With necro and warrior etc you still need to kite to avoid condi, which is where staff comes in handy.
• Ele and rev (need to read boon more) feeds you quickness all the time.
• Against ranger you need to kite during SotP but other than that they also feeds you a lot of quickness.
• Engi is ever the annoying one with stability on evade but with recently added CDs on all their heals they become a lot more manageable.
• Mesmer really depends on who gets the jump, but I think with MoD you have more advantage than typical condi mesmer. I occasionally swap cleanse to arcane thievery (I know you’re rolling your eyes Pyro) just to see if I can let them burn additional shatter as cleanses (or die if not) when I pass back the torment/confusion. Let’s just say even with unblockable feature I’m not impressed, still feels like gamble. I know the trick is that AT need to face enemy to work but still fails here and there for no reason.

Anyway I digress, just want to mention a small trait that is buffed significantly by the new ammy. Do give it a try and let me know what you think about it.

Pretty much my experience albeit a different build. I’m not using furious interruption, but instead seize the moment vs chronophantasma to get the perma quickness with diviner. This helps tremendously in active fights. Sword AA is really nice to cleave downs and rips boons like crazy. I didn’t actually post the build I was running in that thread, but it’s chaos/insp/chrono: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/Chrono-Bruiser-redux

You have a lot less condition removal and no portal, but you’re going after an assassin type lockdown build so it would be different.

It’s good … just have to really watch out for thieves, revs and DH’s …

What game mode are you referring to? In PvP it works as intended (blocking/evading attacks blinds opponent).

In a build like yours I think switching the amulet up a bit depending on what you’re facing can be a good strategy. I’ve run a bit of destroyer in experimenting with hybrid builds last season and in the off season here (along with viper, not so much sinister). It’s interesting the difference in specific cases.

We don’t know exactly how the meta is going to end up, but we have at least a decent idea currently. So here are some general rules IMO with the assumption of what you’ll most likely see in season 4 starting 8/9:

1. Mesmer (carrion condition): Has good condition management so a bit of power burst can be a good thing. Destroyer would be as good as any other amulet.
2. Thief (marauder dps): Going a bit more tanky is always best if possible but if not, going more condition heavy like sinister or viper would be best.
3. Elementalist (???): Likely not in the meta but I’ve been seeing a ton of fresh air which just melts to condition and power builds alike.
4. Necromancer (???): I’ve heard power may be coming back into the meta and that changes the recommendation for amulet … if facing condition, I’d say destroyer is going be pretty good because they’ll likely be running carrion or wanderer. If facing power, more than likely they’ll have a little less condition management (running spite vs curses), so I can see running full condition viper or sinister would be better.
5. Engineer (paladin bruiser): Typically susceptible to conditions if you can land your shatters. Problem more is that they can often simply out heal the condition pressure. Either destroyer or sinister/viper should be fine but I’ve found the power burst from destroyer and/or viper tends to put them on the defensive more quickly and potentially makes them prone to mistakes.
6. Warrior (wanderer condition): For sure destroyer due to the resistance uptime. Much like engineer I’ve been seeing warriors melt recently to power damage in between endure pain procs.
7. Guardian (???): More than likely in the meta now and in dps role. Any kind of ranged pressure is going to preferred and sounds like you handle them well. They have good condition management but also a lot of blocks. I’d say viper/destroyer might edge out more of a condition heavy focus.
8. Revenant (marauder dps): Either option should work, with revs you have to more so make sure you don’t get bursted down quickly in a glass build.
9. Ranger (mender support): Being they will use a glassy amulet, power hybrid damage should do well against them. They are also somewhat susceptible to conditions, understanding they will cleanse all of them once every 10 seconds at least, so if you’re more condition focused you have to time the burst in between astral form.

EDIT: Forgot ranger …

trooper.2650:

Straight to the point. This is the build I am so happy with.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vhAQRAsa7PncfCFqhlpBOqhlXjqsC6tgDNAypmoeYT2lF-TJRAQA8jAg/gAAOBA0HAAA

Granted it gives me high survivability even when running a glass amulet, I have been playing it both with destroyer and sinister.

It works very well with both, but what would you say it fits the build better?
The way I see it is, if I add the values of four stats Destroier provides, the result is higher than what I would get by adding Sinister’s 3 stats values, thus making it a more solid choice for a pure dps/glass cannon. Am I right?

Also, which professions/builds would counter one or the other choice?

Thank you for helping me out with this dilemma :thoughtful:

To be honest, if full glass is your goal I think Viper would be best for that build. Have you tried that?

Fay.2357:

Back during season 3 before I remembered that PvP in this game is a waste of time, I mostly played Dom/chaos/chrono full interrupt bruiser with some tanky amulet and tankier runes (can’t remember what exactly). It worked rather well for me as long as the other team didn’t have so much boon stacking that I couldn’t strip stability.

Interesting, might have to give it a shot as long as I can keep a spot for portal.

messiah.1908:

i tried it (you took my post lol)
the problem is too squishy with no armor so thief can gank you hard fast and easy even under protection

Ross Biddle.2367:

Thief was the first thing that came to mind.

When you can’t pressure a thief back, they’re going to keep coming, and coming, and coming. Eventually you’ll go down.

@messiah, ha – seems you have a good variant as well.

I’ve found thief and rev are by far the most difficult, but I wouldn’t call it a hard counter or completely one sided if played well. I have enough damage to give them a scare and enough sustain to go toe to toe with them most of the time.

Still, running with 18k health is dangerous with no armor but the team support is pretty stellar.

I’ve been playing the classic chaos/insp/chrono build but with Diviner amulet for the crazy boon duration.

With just battle sigils on each weapon set, bountiful disillusionment and random staff AA procs, you can keep 15 stacks of might on yourself reliably in active fights. Add to that all the other BD/staff boons plus perma protection from chaotic dampening and you have a pretty stalwart on point fighter.

I took a page from messiah’s experiments with radiance rune and added that to the mix, giving decent vitality and high uptime on chaos armor which just means more protection.

Take illusionary inspiration and you have a pretty solid boon share option to go with good damage and sustain. It’s great being able to do marauder level damage but with more sustain than marauder due to the perma boons.

Been having a lot of fun with it of late. Anyone else been trying something similar?

messiah.1908:

Ross Biddle.2367:

skcamow.3527:

Hard to see something like this not being better than if ran with inspiration. Sure you have three condition management sources but it just seems the SoI clutch survivability is just too good.

Only the difference the boon stripping can make is detrimental to the other team (takes the hard counter of the war and flips the table, for example). So if you can pull it off without inspiration then it’s worth it.

Shield will still win out over torch, especially for point holder.

the stability on demand is far better than the cleanse. and also it has more conditions handling abilities
torch – 2
pd – 2 or even more on low cd – great for 1v1
null – 5 ticking
healing well – 1
resistance with F5 for 2 sec

so inspiration line only yield 5 and with soi 10 with another 2 on healing skill. the main difference is the healing part when shatter.

i swap for sword/sh +sc/t also work nice

You definitely have condition management covered but being it’s still a condition build intended to bring down opponents, the SoI loss is huge. Not just for the extra heal sustain but damage pressure. The investment in boon rip is great, but the iDisenchanter has historically never been a reliable option on point and still has the morbid cast time. Maybe the recent patch changes will help, but not too optimistic.

I know you excluded portal intentionally but I personally wouldn’t ever run without it in soloq or with coordination in any scenario other than maybe a bunker.

Still, would like to see a vid to gauge it.

Hard to see something like this not being better than if ran with inspiration. Sure you have three condition management sources but it just seems the SoI clutch survivability is just too good.

I rocked a destroyer build for portions of last season, though quite a bit different with sc/sh-staff chrono. It worked really well. I went back and forth with destroyer/viper and finally decided destroyer was what I liked due to the power burst damage ability that viper doesn’t have.

You already have good crit chance, no need to buff it further with danger time. You’d get much more out of illusionary reversion and I’d even say go with chronophantasma. More illusions = more potential damage any way you slice it.

One possible conclusion: The system giving fresh accounts “average” MMR as Anet has previously stated must be so high in comparison to the MMR of people participating in the leagues at all levels. The average MMR + winning your first 5-10 games must be putting players in oft recurring advantageous match making scenarios.

The average MMR plays heavily into facilitating speedy runs to legend to create a possible situation where the player may not be at legend skill level (instead carried by their initial MMR).

You hear time and again of players struggling with their main account to get through the tiers and on a fresh account it’s much easier to progress. Same player, different accounts. Generally speaking, it should not be this way.

As for a solution, hard to say but for sure the MMR of fresh accounts should be heavily scrutinized.

So if the wildcard tournament is reserved for the top current PL teams, what was the point of the season 2 guild challenger league?

Guild Wars 2 PL announcement

Does the season 2 challenger league now just become something relevant only if there continues to be pro league activity after the world championship? Because from what I’ve been hearing the continuation of PL is definitely not set in stone …

Acandis.3250:

BlaqueFyre.5678:

I think it’s funny they say it’s due to load screen times but they have no problem allowing people to swap classes by logging out and in which causes longer load screens.

This is something they’ve tried to get rid of in the past but I can’t remember it ever having been received well.

Regardless, I for one would do a lot for PvE if I didn’t have to stay in the mists 30-60 minutes waiting for my queues to pop. It’s unreal.

Maybe even WvW? They could implement something that restricts content known to take a moderate amount of time to complete such as dungeons/fractals/raids, leaving open world PvE and WvW available to players while waiting for ques. There’s plenty to do, at least better than killing svanir and chieftan over and over.

Really surprised I haven’t seen anything specific for MH pistol, used to be the big thing it seemed most mesmers wanted most.

EDIT: I see apharma’s there, gunslinger could be cool.

For sure boon rip has become much more of an effective option to build in. More than likely this means domination line to take shattered concentration. Null field is just too much of a risk vs signet of illusions (assuming you’re taking insp line and portal). The stab/resistance stab from various meta comps is definitely a problem, at least in PvP.

messiah.1908:

skcamow.3527:

Using destroyer amulet in a hybrid scepter/sh build, most fun I’ve had since pre-HoT. You’re glass of course but with all the damage mitigation from sc/sh, staff and inspiration you’re very sustainable.

In the meta build Dragon hunters are close to a hard counter; in this build they’re easy as you don’t have to just rely on melee to BF burst and your conditions to get them down by attrition. Confusing images alone takes 1/3 of their health with the marauder damage. Condition damage generally averages around 30% of total damage.

I may make a thread about it one of these days, too lazy.

i still dont know as only 700 condition dmg which taking almost half of it compare to carrion. while getting 50% crit chance and 187 crit dmg . so if power shatter is still not good why you think 700 condi dmg covering over the lost dmg?
while also being glassy as hell (thief and dh unless you not holding/contest a point)

Not saying it’s better than meta, I’ll clear that up. It’s just a very, very refreshing change of pace. It’s nice doing power shatter damage in a match but adding that extra 30% with conditions. It’s a lot for opponents to deal with because they can’t exactly ignore the conditions while I’m bursting all over them.

One other thing I do a bit different is heal mantra which provides better overall personal survivability than the heal well due to the shorter CD and restorative mantras heal (plus the 600 toughness when charging). Add the shatter heals + signet of illusions and you’re very sustainable.

And let’s face it, at this point every viable amulet (excluding wanderer/rabid that people don’t seem to be running) is glass. Sure carrion/sage give the great extra health pool which helps mostly in dealing with conditions. If you have inspiration you don’t have a problem with those anyway. Heal mantra helps tremendously here as well.

EDIT: I’m also planning to run my build with viper which should be better damage overall. Just having a lot of fun with destroyer atm.

trooper.2650:

skcamow.3527:

too lazy.

Just tell me this:

• other weapon set?
• do you use Inspiration?

Yep I mentioned staff and inspiration in the post.

Using destroyer amulet in a hybrid scepter/sh build, most fun I’ve had since pre-HoT. You’re glass of course but with all the damage mitigation from sc/sh, staff and inspiration you’re very sustainable.

In the meta build Dragon hunters are close to a hard counter; in this build they’re easy as you don’t have to just rely on melee to BF burst and your conditions to get them down by attrition. Confusing images alone takes 1/3 of their health with the marauder damage. Condition damage generally averages around 30% of total damage.

I may make a thread about it one of these days, too lazy.

Rocking a destroyer hybrid for the past week, will see how it fares. I have a wanderer build as well I want to test in ranked, given me a lot of success the past month.

shion.2084:

So important question… What are new players categorized at for the match making? Please tell me your not leaving them at the 50% mark, because anyone under that who gets teamed with them is actually likely to loose which will drop their MMR further (along with the new folks whom they’ll team with again)? In general its a step in the right direction trying to at least keep the teams reasonably close in skill level.

Had the same question myself …

Any chance we can get a bit more info on the match making logic like was provided prior to season 2?

Not divulging this info is going to create even more speculation. At least last season we had something to point uninformed folks to who questioned what they were experiencing.

Maybe Anet thought it was too easy to tank VG :/

Dethl.2875:

“Echo of Memory: The recharge of this skill will now begin when Time Echo’s effect ends.”

Am I reading this correctly, as in shield block will not go on recharge until the 2nd block is used? And not only does that already suck, PoM won’t affect it until then either?

Yep that’s what it’s looking like in game. I think this got a bit over nerfed (with PoM) but it’s not terrible. Maybe just start with echo of memory but they went with both.

Also I echo what others have said, the core specs just continue to sadly get dumped on.

Crowley.8761:

What a lot of people fail to understand is that the “meta build” is designed around a specific composition, a composition you most likely won’t be playing.

On the contrary, the meta build by definition is the strongest build that can be played on that profession in that specific game mode.

Crowley.8761:

TL;DR – Power works just fine as well as condi, you just gotta know how to use it.

Unfortunately this is not true and it’s not a simple matter of knowing how to use it. An equally skilled mesmer playing a power shatter build and a condition shatter build will currently perform at a higher level with the condition build. If that weren’t the case, the condition build wouldn’t be meta.

That said, I’m a HUGE advocate for experimenting with builds and you make an good point about playing whatever you want in unranked. I love playing all kinds of builds. You can indeed make many different things work in that mode but yet, meta is still meta. Generally speaking, even in unranked, condition shatter is going to be the stronger build to run.

The disparity of build viability becomes much more pronounced in season play (season 3 begins this week). The competition gets much more stiff than unranked and you very quickly realize your best bet to win is to play meta. I went through that pain and discovered this for myself last season. This isn’t to say that you can’t win by playing something non-meta. I’m saying you give you/your team the best chance to win by playing meta.

So while I very much appreciate and can relate to the sentiment of trying other builds, I want ensure we’re giving the correct information to players wanting to be as successful as possible in PvP.

Fay.2357:

While people like this exist, they’re essentially just target golems.

Which really seems to be 1/2 the people you face in unranked, hence these stated experiences. If only these types of posts were able to take into account encounters vs good players at least most of the time.

Trait seems to work, testing in the mists.

Dristig.9678:

dominik.9721:

Actually everyone good who played condition warr used wanderers don’t know why you guys even crying. I think in pro league nobody ever used mercenary

No one has had a chance to play the build we are talking about in Pro League yet.

I believe Denshee played it with Wanderer in the PL matches Monday.

I believe VM had an official sub but they weren’t available to jump in at that moment. So I guess it’s the same as not having one.

I’ve also heart Frostball had “protection” but also may have exposed his IP inadvertently regardless. A lot of underlying things that went on.

Dextroz.4019:

Why are you removing viper’s amulet?

They aren’t, they’re just refunding the $$$ for anyone who purchased it before 5/17.

Thiefz.3695:

So this will take mesmers out of meta.

Unless any of the myriad of other condition amulets can be made workable. Much experimentation inc

Yeah the call of the mists buff isn’t active, not sure if that was intended but it’s been active for past PL events.

More alarming to me is the usual announcement in game isn’t showing either.

I know these are small details but a company fully committed to something wouldn’t forget the little things like this. Pretty sad IMO.

Fay.2357:

Windwalker.7421:

Yeah but a stun break with a 3/4 second cast time is plainly absurd. Never mind that the rest of the ability is meh anyway you slice it, but that cast time just kills it dead.

It simply can’t compete as a stun break utility with other ones we have, and brings very little otherwise.

By definition of what a stun break is, it has to be short casting or instant…otherwise it simply won’t work when you need it the most.

The stun break occurs instantly. This is why an interrupt will put it on the full cooldown. It works just fine as a stun break, it’s the rest of the skill that’s awful.

The stability is also instant which is a nice feature on a stun break – can be helpful in preventing a chain CC scenario. Because it’s instant it can also be used in simple fashion to mitigate an incoming CC if you’re out of dodges.

messiah.1908:

Curunen.8729:

Xyonon.3987:

I’m not a pvp player but did the last patch not at least give precognition a chance for a comeback?

It’s still bad unfortunately.

i dont think its bad (compare to what we used to have yes its bad)
but atm you hardly need 3 sec aegis (if you get burst) nor the stability. only maybe the break stun . still useable if you dont see anything else to fit in the 3rd slot

I still don’t like the current functionality, but with ~20s CD (assuming perma alacrity), if you’re running the well trait for alacrity sharing it’s not too bad.

Silverkey.2078:

skcamow.3527:

Moa needed a CD reduction in addition to the transform reduction but you take the good with the bad here, at least Moa is better balanced with chrono AND we can still CS elites.

Yes, if we only wanted to change Moa, I would have reduced the duration, reduced the cooldown and increase the visual cue for the cast.

But I still think CS is unbalanceable. All skills are balanced according to effect/cooldown and CS just prevents balancing the CD properly, especially for high CD skills. Any CD higher than 150s is now only 75s, CD of 70-90s can be doubled. How do you balance that?

I get the justification to balance around the math but honestly I don’t think that should be the only, or even predominant consideration.

In this case you look at the raw power of the elites we have and consider if doubling them with CS is a problem through the lens of overall game balance (other profession specs and their strength).

Moa was deemed a problem and addressed (albeit needing the CD reduction). Double Gravity Well, Time Warp and Mass Invisibility have never been a large issue; the glaring one was Moa.

If ability to CS elites is taken away, sure that balances core mesmer better but at the same time it further reduces the chance that chronomancer builds other than the current condition meta become viable.

This is where the lazy argument comes into play. I think Anet can absolutely balance chronomancer and mesmer without taking CS/elite ability away. It just requires a bit of creativity. I’m not saying I have full faith in Anet and their ability per se, but I think it’s possible.

Fay.2357:

Does it actually work with chaos armor now? In the past (multiple times) I tested radiance runes and they never procced any of their effects nor affected chaos armor durations.

Chaos armor definitely extends with the 33% aura duration in my testing and you also get swiftness with it, feel free to validate.