Guild Wars 2

DevO.9854:

I don’t think we will see a TDM because that does not encourage combat, in a lot of ways. I mean consider having a entire team of theifs who just run and hide then all jump someone at the same time then go run and hide again.

That does not sound fun at all. Unless they find some way around that I don’t see it happening.

Arena needs new, smaller maps, like they were in GW.
Playing arena on conquest designed ma kitten tupid, of course.

Mrbig.8019:

NevirSayDie.6235:

And people wonder why the assassin class always gets nerfed.

lol the good part is this build is not even viable in tPvP.

Even when pushed at max damage, S/D is mediocre at best, even with flanking strike fixed.

Sword is slow and has bad dps ( good cleave, but it’s so slow you’re going to get more damage than you deal) and OH dagger is terribad.

It also is very ini consuming, and 80% of times you would be better with a D/P build.

But i have to say that no matters what you do with your thief, you’ll always get people hate ( and this one is not even the rudest whisper i got lol )

Man, S/D never was bad.
Looks like you are running it while thinking it isn’t viable. Looks like a contraddiction to me.

Zenith.7301:

Sword damage isn’t too low — dagger burst is just kitten compared to sword cleave. As long as backstab continues to take off half of people’s HP bars outside bunkers you won’t see thieves taking any swords where they actually have to work more for a kill.

It’s the same deal with pistol/pistol vs. shortbow. P/P/ is fine in itself, but shortbow is so much better thanks to cluster and infiltrator cheese.

Broken setups always have players wanting their other setups to be as broken strong. Similar to eles complaining about why can’t their utilities be more like cantrips when cantrips need to be nerfed instead of bringing the other utilities to that level.

This. One million times.

Protip: run 0/30/20/20/0 with full zerker/valk/knight gear. That is the build I think the op is talking about. Lots of evades, ridiculous condition cleansing, average damage. All the worthy damage bonuses are in critical strikes traitline. No need for deathly arts.

ensoriki.5789:

People trying to nerf the God skill now?
Be gone.
Odd how people are complaing about things S/D has always had.
It had More evades before the patch has hit just as hard.
The only difference is most people couldn’t land FS, Mug was nerfed and it didn’t steal the boons. Outside of small changes its the same it’s always been (excusing unblockable 2nd hit)

The reason is simple.
Before S/D got buffed and Mug nerfed, nearly no thief ran that build simply because there was no need to use an underperforming (compared to the thief average, of course) build.

Infiltrator’s Strike has always been too good. But now that it is on the same bar of the new FS and people are running only that, it is simply too much, that’s it. S/D did not need a buff, the overperforming builds needed a nerf so the other build can rise. This is what was happening in the last period with D/P and S/D. Now they have buffed S/D to annoy boon-bunkers a bit more, while, essentialy there was no real need to do so.

The fact that I’m saying an opinion now about IS and evades does not mean that I did not think that before the patch. Now, these “small” (but they aren’t that small, after all) changes hit the whole set, not only a single skill. You have to see the whole picture, not the single skill change.

Travlane.5948:

s/d is the most confusing build in the game for an enemy to play against if specced/utilities are right… 100% nothing more confusing than dozens of teleports with dozens of invis and several dazes and a couple doesnt evades and a heal every 15 secs with dozens of blinds…..although dmg is average its very hard to defend against a professional s/d player which takes many months of mastering…… can be proven. or do u have a counterpoint which example of build/class? plz do go on. dont just say well if u believe it thats nice….then i respond “well if u dont im sorry for your lack of experience” then we get nowhere like 6th graders arguing if somebody is out in dodgeball. come correct. nothign wrong with debating or “opinionizing” .

Yes. You are right. The S/D skillcap is higher compared to other thief’s builds. BUT, BUT, this doesn’t mean that evades aren’t too much. They should be toned down a bit to the point that you can’t afford to spam them, but you can be extremely effective if you time them correctly. Right now, you can just spam you evades getting nice results.

Also, Infiltrator’s Strike should be looked into. No-cooldown stunbreaker is insane, seriously.

Travlane.5948:

thieves and d/d eles are the hardest to play…..play well at that. mesmers are easy. tell u what. give me 3 choices of class to pick. ill play it and beat you one on one atleast half thetime. all i have truly mastered is thief. so u will ahve the advantage. then tell me how easy it is.

Oh, boy…
Well, the important thing is that you believe so.

What? Did I read “Thief” and “too much” in the same topic?
Hundreds of players will come here and say L2P baddie, improve your skill and blah blah blah.

Guys, I play a Thief myself and I’m planning to move to Thief as my main profession (just need some time to gear it out properly). Yes, they are definitely not that good in PvE, but in PvP and WvWvW, man… Only a stupid can say they are on the weak side or balanced.

And yes, they dodge too much.
Just spending 20 points in the Acrobatic traitline gives you a massive amount of free dodge and evades.
Pick the Vigorous Recovery with Withdraw and S/D and you are a dodge bunny.
Essentialy, you can dodge more than twice as often as a normal profession do, plus you have FS, Withdraw, an optional Roll for Initiative and Infiltrator’s Strike.
Who needs toughness and vitality? You can just spam dodge and mitigate 3/4 of the overall damage. The other 1/4 is healed.

Oh, did I mentioned the recharge-less stunbreaker?

S/D was already strong before the buff and most of the thief community didn’t realize that because they were too busy into spamming 2 on D/D.
Now they literally pushed a new boon-hate thief meta. Bye Guardians, bye Elementalists.

Bas.7406:

Kravick, you know I like you, but you are way off. Poison fields give weakness which doesn’t work against bang bang classes, but in a majority of tournaments, there are no bang bang classes, everyone is bunker, condition, or hybrid. Weakness = 50 percent less damage = easier chance to kill. Poison right before a theif/mesmer hits and boom your guardian can’t do enough to keep himself up.

Thieves are always trying to apply poisons, and Mesmers are one of the absolute worse organized tournament classes unless you have a team that doesn’t pay attention. Shatter mesmers get condition crushed and you can easily dodge all of their damage.

Thieves are situational. You use them to strike weakened targets or protect your necro and ranger. If you are dying in three seconds in a tournament to a thief as a necro there is something else wrong there.

We are not talking about Poison itself, we are talking about Poison field, which is arguably the worse combo field in the game, maybe Dark field can be as bad as Poison field is, which is, guess what, another almost-exclusive to Necromancers.

Weakness does not grants 50% less damage. Weakness grants 50% chance of getting 50% less damage on non-critical strikes, which is different.

Did I actually read that Poison field is one of the most useful field in the game?
Strange. I always knew it was the most worthless.

The whole thing is:
if you run scissor to beat paper and you lose to rock, that doesn’t mean that scissor has to be nerfed, neither that paper must be buffed.
Running scissor means you are accepting the risk to meet rock and lose against, while being effective against paper.
Everyone, then, will run neither scissor, neither rock, neither paper. Just an hybrid to be effective against everything.

Mooncrosser.7519:

They can be equally hard because of the different mechanics. I’ll give you an example:

Let’s say we got a Mesmer and a Necromancer that are well balanced to fight each other and on the other hand, a Thief and a Necromancer. Hypothetically the Mesmer is running a confusion build. This build (theoretically) might be really good for fighting a Thief, so good that we can say, Mesmer>Thief. So we nerf the confusion so Mesmer=Thief. But that will hit the Mesmer/Necromancer balance and if we nerf the Necromancer, the Thief/Necromancer balance will be broken, so we nerf the Thief and we’re back to the starting point.

My point is, easier said than done :/

Well, no.
Actually, because every profession have access to multiple spec and multiple hybrid, the main goal is to find a combination who can counter almost everything, to find the best balance inside the profession itself.

Let’s say, taking your example, that the confusion build is really strong against the Thief. Instead of nerfing the confusion build, the player should put some condition removals in his build in order to have a better counter against the confusion build. Has the Thief access to enough condition removals, maybe at the cost of some damage, in order to counter the confusion build? Yes? The game is balanced. No? The thief needs some buff in condition removals. As simple as it is.

Another example can be Guardian vs Thief. A raw burst thief can do nothing against a bunker guardian. But has Thief enough tools to kill a guardian? Yes. He just have to focus on a more balanced build, bringing maybe some boon removals. Obviously, if you want to kill a bunker Guardian, which is an imbalanced build on defenses made just to counter heavy bursters, with a glass Thief, you are going to lose.

We aren’t talking about the balance of a specific build, we are talking about the balance of a whole profession, which is incredibly easy to archieve in a 1vs1 environment.

When talking about teamplay, on the other hand, it is almost impossible to get balance. Just see at the actual tPvP meta, it is a mess at best.

Mrbig.8019:

try doing that with a war spamming chop or 100blades and see who dies.

The warrior, if he’s standing still in a 120 radius field. About 50% of his hits will fail, more than enough to harm a good portion of the damage output.

Face the reality, none is spamming melee skills in that field. This theorycrafting makes no sense.

Mooncrosser.7519:

Dueling will not be balanced EVER. But that does not make it useless. In my guild, we’ve done plenty of duels just to test our builds or practice playing versus an opponent of a specific class. I don’t see a feature for duels in a competitive play, but I see great opportunity for a training one.

Actually, balancing around 1vs1 is way, way easier than balancing in teamplay.
Simply because when balancing around teamplay, you have to consider a massive amount of possible skill combinations and interations with other professions, making balancing way, way harder.
It is just math, not opinions.

Mrbig.8019:

Hello, i welcome to you Black Powder.

It’s a pusling blind field, pulsing blind every sec, basically S/D rate of attack.

A simple blind field totally neglects 90% of an S/D thief damage, due to how slow sword attacks are. Better if i do not mention Flanking strike.

If a D/P thief loses to an S/D thief, he’s simply bad.

Nah, horrible.

Nah, he should change proff or uninstall.

That’s why you have also a secondary weapon set.
Black Powder harms every melee, not only S/D. Don’t pretend it isn’t true.

Dueling is just one of the things this game lacks.
The first time I read about the absence of dedicate healers and the new action-based combat system, I automatically thought “HELL YEAH, DUELS!”.
And what we had? A game that has nothing of what made GW1 PvP great, no dueling system and only a dumb conquest gamemode with insanely stupid meta.
GW1 hasn’t sold 6 millions copies because of PvE or e-sports, neither because of a conquest mode, in fact, that was the only mode GW1 lacked (excluding some HA rounds). I wonder where the original GW1 PvP team is.

Mrbig.8019:

what sustained damage ?

S/D damage is laughable.

HGH engi has good sustained damage

shatter mesmer has good sustained damage

ele dps has good sustained damage

Thief sustained is laughable EVEN when built as a glass cannon, guess how it is when built for survival.

C’mon please.

Yes, yes.
I understood your point.
Thief is incredibly bad and it should be buffed in every aspect.
Seriously… Stop this.

Med.6150:

Does nobody see the inherent flaws with stealing boons for survivability?

Let me state a couple of these:

1. You engage without boons and limited burst due to the nature of the weapon set and the nerf to Mug

2. You need to attack bunkers to actually gain access to boons that make you sturdier

3. Most boons are constantly reapplied by those “depending” on them. Stealing a boon at a time that lasts 3 seconds will have little to no impact

4. You need to be able to stay in the fray and actually in melee range of your target to steal boons.

5. The Thief post patch will be just as squishy as he’s now when engaged. So if you get bursted to 30%, what will you do? Turn around and say "oh, no problem, I am just going to steal that regen that will tick for 130 (you know it will be scaling with your stats, don’t you) on me and I’ll be fine!?

6. There are quite a few classes who will retain their burst capabilities and not offer any boons to you, because they do not rely on boons for their survivability

Have you seen the video someone linked few posts ago?
That video alone shows you why you are wrong.

S/D is not about burst, it is about sustained damage. If you run that weapon set as a full glass cannon, of course you are going to die. Spend some trait points into Acrobatics and Shadow Arts and you’ll see how squishy thieves are… if you manage to hit them.

Mrbig.8019:

Lol it’s common knowledge that thief is bad, aside D/P burst, in tPvP.

Go outside of hotjoin for a moment and try the thief, ANY OTHER thief build aside D/P burst with ANY OTHER utility skills aside Shadow refuge, shadowstep and sin signet and take a look at how effective and useful to your team you are.

Even devs said “thief is strong at low elo , but struggles at higher ratings”.

If you believe thief is good , you can draw your own conclusions.

Basing their opinion around common knowledge is what stupids do.
I don’t want to believe you are stupid. Either I want to believe that your only argument against is “common knowledge” or a “try from yourself”, like I didn’t.

Thief is powerful at what it is supposed to do. The only problem is that elementalist overshadow him, that’s all.

That doesn’t mean that there isn’t something that can use a buff, that means that this something which needs a buff isn’t FS and that thief isn’t that bad as you are depicting it.

Mrbig.8019:

S/D is grossly bad and underpowered, along with 70% of other thief sets ( condi builds, S/P, S/D, P/P, P/D) and along with 80% of thief traits and U-skills.

There is no point into have a reasoning with you.
You are too biased toward your profession. This statement is utterly stupid to be said by a impartial point of view.

Mrbig.8019:

LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL

FS is bad and S/D is underpowered.

OH dagger is horribad and the whole set is clunky and unreliable.

S/D was killed the day they nerfed tactical strike and OH dagger.

They not only should buff FS ( and they will), they should also give this set more dmage and revert the nerf to tactical strike ( or buff it slightly, in order to get a 2.5 daze with runes or sigils) .

It may be the most complete and skillful set in all theif arsenal, but does bad literally EVERY thing ( control, support, evading, damage).

S/D is totally NO GOOD.

I know that being used to P/D or backstab can make everything else look underpowered.

Now that they revert revealed to 3s, they have buffed enough S/D.
Being able to daze people for 2.5s every 3 second isn’t balanced, in case you didn’t know.

1k/1.5k damage on Death Nova isn’t that high.
Considering that Bone Minions explode on a 1s delay, their explosion is mostly unreliable thanks to their dumb AI and that the overall damage exploding both minion will be 6-7k (which is exactly the damage of a single backstab or a fire grab), it isn’t that overpowered.

At the moment, Death Nova is plain worthless, despite the fact that it has lot of potential.

Don’t forget we are talking about a Grandmaster Trait, not a minor trait everyone can bring. You have to invest 30 traitpoints into the Death Magic traitline to get this trait. Also, you are able to get this damage “on-demand” only with Bone Minions. Other minions must be killed by enemies to get only 1k damage, which isn’t that much considering the average cooldown of minions to be summoned.

I always loved S/D.
In the thief forum, it is common sense that FS is bad and S/D is underpowered. False.

Actually this is one of the most complete and versatile weapon set thief has. It isn’t stupid like P/D conditions or D/D backstab.

Anyway I bet we’ll see a new meta once FS get buffed. IMHO it doesn’t need a buff at all.

I’m asking myself, how is that trait worth taking? 5 seconds poison on minion’s death?
I think it would be way more interesting if it dealt damage (maybe 1000-1500?), also considering that minions, at this point, are good only at dying.

I’d not put any point into Curses, mainly because the Condition Damage get wasted (200 is really low) and Precision does not increase your damage output that much.
I’d rather spend those 20 leftover trait points on Death Magic or Spite.
Greater Marks is a must have in every PvE/WvW Necro imho.

Mesmer.
They are always a must have in every team.
They are also extremely good soloers, while Necros completely suck at that.

jportell.2197:

Here right here you show your extreme lack of understanding of the mesmer class. It’s not the 1S of daze that matters. Its the trait DAZZLING which is inflict vulnerability when you daze an opponent. http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Dazzling and that applies when a clone bursts on the target.. And if we interrupt you with any of those we apply extra vulnerability. So that PLUS mindwrack PLUS Mental Torment PLUS precise wrack is how we get our mindwracks to do good damage… If we didn’t stack the vulnerability beforehand mindwrack would not hurt anyone but a full GC. :/ I guess you really need to understand how mesmer burst works… No 20/20/0/0/30 mesmer will do good damage without diversion first.

Yes. 8s of 5 stacks of vulnerability. Shattering all clones…
Sure, everyone use this.
I’ve already said that I’m done. There is no point into arguing with you.
You are the kind of person who ruined GW2’s PvP and I think there is nothing I can do to make you change your mind. Enjoy your imbalances. We’ll see again on Shatter nerf or when GW2’s PvP will be completely dead.

Jax.5261:

It does. Sorry to burst your Sanctuary!

Yup, seems legit.
Wasting 3 clones just for inflicting 1s of Daze. Yeah, fair enough.
Then you Mind Wrack the air.

jportell.2197:

Ergh. And by the time iLeap recharges guess what is still on CD Diversion which is a big part of our combo. Thieves can reset their combo every three seconds (p/d thieves are scarier to mesmers than a BS thief) And warrior 100 blades can reset it sooner as well. Because a mindwrack without the preemptive diversion hardly hits at all.

…
So a shatter combo uses Diversion before the burst starts.
I’ve heard enough. I’m done.

jportell.2197:

Then you have never seen iLeap… Possibly one of the biggest animations in game (aside from churning earth) it comes speeding at you in a form that no other class or skill does and if you are on a hill then you will see nothing because the mesmer will hit iLeap and the clone will just be standing there with its thumb up its rear then decide “oh right I was supposed to be doing something” an.. So by the time the clone does get to its target the swap has worn off and there for there is no immobilize anymore and therefore the ability to dodge roll is there and therefore you have negated most or all of the mesmers shatter. And I am sorry but the damage from a mind wrack even when traited doesn’t compare to 100B or Backstab… It just… no… not even close. Andd thieves burst toned down? I said the perks they get from stealth should be looked at… And also in another thread on here people have talked about necro skills that hit for 7k. So therefore Mesmer’s burst still compares with other classes burst. What’s funny is these classes still have more viable builds in pvp then a mesmer. But I’m done you clearly just think that mesmers need nerfed into oblivion because the only way a buff would be substantial is if the blind/invuln stopping the summon is removed (making being a bunker easier ie phantasmal defender gets summoned no matter what) or if confusion is made worthwhile so a confusion mesmer can actually do something and neither one of those will happen and the confusing images/greatsword buff is situational at best and not a general buff.

1) I-Leap is obvious, Swap isn’t. Swap can happen in any moment in a time window of 5 seconds. I-Leap recharges in 12s, this means that you can afford to waste a I-Leap if you see that the target is prepared, something Thieves and Warriors can’t afford to do (waste their opener).
2) Damage of 100B and Backstab can be easily compared to shatter. Each shatter deals approximately 3k damage, while Blurried Frenzy deal 4-5k damage. This is 5+3+3+3 = 14k damage, which is more or less the damage of HB and Backstab.
3) Again, you proved that you know nothing about Necros but you are keeping mentioning them. The only skill which rarely hits for 7k damage si Ghastly Claws, which is a 3s channeling skill…
4) I don’t think Mesmer needs to be nerfed into oblivion. I don’t know if you are stupid or you have serious comprehension problems, but looks like you forget what someone says in the previous post once you answer the next one. Making important parts bold isn’t enough for you.
But yes, everyone hates Mesmer, I’m a bad person who want Mesmer to be removed from the game and I won’t stop until it happens, I want that everyone who plays Mesmer deserves to die and blah blah blah. Fell free to believe what you want.

jportell.2197:

And the same arguments people make to avoid burst of other classes (warrior 100B, thief backstab, engi 100nades) is just as valid for mesmer burst! Warriors preempt 100B with some form of stun or immob before and Engi 100Nades is more dangerous because it has a higher AOE but as people have stated for avoiding the 100B warrior or Bas venom thief USE A STUN BREAK and people still ignore this… , Mesmers combo is OBVIOUS and few people are 1shotted by a mesmer shatter unless they are GC in which case it is an inherent risk. And shatters have an obvious animation in iLeap a pre cursor to shatters has extremely obvious animation and actually lands on the target 6/10 times and if you have any sort of z-axis advantage half of the mesmers burst WONT LAND! How much easier to avoid do you want?! And the devs have stated they can essentially do nothing about the bugginess of iLeap. So there is one inherent advantage of fighting a shatter mesmer and one that nearly all mesmers scream about is severely limiting… And that is built into the game. And the best ay they could buff other builds. Is remove the blind/invuln for summons and make confusion actually worth a kitten in PvP. Right now I am sure that neither of those will happen and the nerf to shatters is going to come with a buff that is a situational buff at best! And confusing images is in general a poor skill in PvP because confusion is an overly weak condition in PvP except on mesmers in the current meta because in the current meta mesmers have NO CONDITION REMOVAL because using that would make them lose utility they have to their team and if they pack null field as i said they won’t have a stun break to get out of 100b or backstabs…

It is always the same kitten.
You say Thieves should burst should be toned down and they say “But Mesmer have this, this and blah blah blah”, you say to Mesmers that their burst should be toned down and they say “But Thieves and Warriors blah blah blah”. It is childish and stupid and balance doesn’t work like that.

Mesmer burst animation isn’t obvious FYI.

Man, I’ve said thousand times in my other posts that Shatter build is imbalanced but also that Mesmer can use some buffs to other builds.

Stop act like you get paid to defend the Mesmer. There are imbalances in the shatter build, they are right there in front of everyone’s eyes. You can’t ignore them just because Mesmer has no other valid build. If you want to balance the game you have to nerf the overpowered builds (shatter) and buff the underpowered builds. It doesn’t work like you have an overpowered build, but every other builds are trash, so it is balanced. No, it’s not.

Nerfing the Shatter build does not mean killing the burst of Mesmers, it just means toning it down or making it easier to avoid. That’s it. No one dies, no Mesmer will be kicked off every game, no worlds end.

Mine is not a blind hate toward Mesmers, I just hate the imbalances you are defending for the sake of no one knows.

jportell.2197:

I didn’t say mesmers are BAD bunkers. In 1v1’s they are great at bunkering and taking damage except for dun dun dun CONDITIONS! But in team’s there main source of bunkering the Phantasmal Defender goes down ridiculously fast! And like all phantasms it can be blinded/invuln. And the nerf to chaos storm makes being a conditon mesmer even more of a joke! And probably needs buffs? DEFINITELY NEEDS BUFFS. What’s funny is they are buffing Spatial Surge and confusing images as a method to justify possible nerfs to shatters. I know if that nerf is anything significant most mesmers will quit (i won’t i’ll find a way to make a build and still get called OP by kittenes like you). And guess what I started playing a necro in hot join AND tourney (for those that think playing tourney is necessary to have a kittening opinion). And it did quite well! Especially using wells and corrupt boon. OMG is that skill insane… And I didn’t use teleport because I know its limitations but its still there and while not as amazing as mesmer portal it still DOES INSTANT TRANSPORT. And I also laughed off all conditions because OH lemme heal… Or OH lemme send ALL my conditions to you buddy… SO when i was playing the necro I didn’t really care about conditions because it fueled my damage/conditions to my enemy… And in a group fight the green ground is not nearly as obvious as the pink borders of a mesmer null field. Not saying i wouldn’t perform better on my mesmer but that is because i need to learn more on the necro and find some of the better builds they have…

And once again most teams would scream if a mesmer brought pistol over focus… Focus is good for AOE pulls KD. The pistol utility is less so for a team. ONCE AGAIN TEAM!

How many times do I have to say that I and nobody cares how you perform on Necro? How many times do I have to say that nobody cares about your experience?

If I’m an OP kittener, you are for sure one of those guys who exploits to the bone FotM professions, defend them (so their easy wins) till death until they get fairly nerfed and start complaining how bad is ANet at balancing, how this game suck and blah blah blah while the day before said the game was fine and well balanced.

The whole argument with you was you posting your “personal experiences” backed with no kind of proof, you complaining how bad are condition removal while I’ve said that, if you pick up the right skills/traits, they aren’t that bad and you justifying all the flaws Mesmer has by quoting other professions saying “Look, other professions are imba too” while saying, in the same post, that the balance isn’t that bad.

Make order in your ideas, stop looking at the game with your pink-coloured glasses and, after, come back here to have a mature REASONING.

jportell.2197:

cut
Something funny about this list! These conditions are all without using traits!
Guess how often mesmer can cause conditions without traits (Cry of Frustration) 30s CD!
Cripple 20Second CD
Winds of chaos (random so unreliable and its hard to stack them!)
And then chaos storm which has had its CD increased (god knows why prolly to please people like sorrow) and the conditions from it are random and have a very short duration.

So what’s even funnier is we have crap condi removal and have a harder time applying conditions than some of these other classes with great condition removal.

And edit for your edit Mr. Sorrow. The shatter build is strong yes… But any other build for tourney’s just severely lacks. Even in a full bunker build we rely on clone/phantasm management. And if we are trying to bunker then we aren’t shattering them every 2 seconds.

You clearly never played a Necro.

1) Well of Corruption converts just ONE boon per pulse. Just try it from yourself ingame.
2) The Well of Corruption animation is way, way more obvious compared to the Null Field animation. It completely paints the ground of a greenish light, while Null Field only show the borders.
3) Ground targeting wells ISN’T a trait that most Necro take. It is a master major trait in the Condition Damage (so not useful to every Necro) traitline to have less range compared to Null Field. Just the same, uh?
4) The duration of Well of Corruption is 5s. The duration of “bugged” Null Field is 5s. It is exactly the same, but Well of Corruption does half the job.
5) Flesh Wurm does no teleport you exactly back when the wurm is. If you are 1200+ away, it will just teleport 1200 range away in the direction of the Flesh Wurm and does not ignore walls. Just try it by yourself, because you clearly didn’t.

Not everyone runs condition. Not every profession has the ability to spam AoE conditions properly and, considering the fact that mesmer have also condition removals (see Null Field), conditions aren’t really a real counter.

In case you didn’t noticed, you have Sharper Images, which is the best condition applying trait combined with Illusionary Unload and Phantasmal Fury. You have also Winds of Chaos and spammable clones with Winds of Chaos that applies quite nice conditions. So, also Mesmers are quite good at conditions, don’t pretend it isn’t true. This completely overshadow the fact that other professions can apply conditions without traits, because, you know, usually people use traits in competitive environments, and Mesmer have incredibly good traits.

Chaos Storm was nerfed because it also dazed the enemy, in case you didn’t know. AoE daze. Pretty weak. Lol.

I don’t care if Mesmers are bad bunkers. As I said before, the Mesmer class is completely imbalanced and it probably needs buffs in other areas other then nerf. But denying that this game’s balance is a mess is stupid and you contraddicted yourself few lines after you said the balance is fine by saying that Mesmer are bad bunkers.

jportell.2197:

And necros are getting some buffs (most likely getting portal!) And other movement buffs as well! And the reason some classes can do certain things that other classes can’t is the entire point of team play! And I tell you right now ele and guardian are way more required to have on a team then a Mesmer… And yes it really does rely on managing clones… because if you dodge roll or do something that destroys a clone without shattering it then you just wasted that illusion and have hurt yourself… Blurred frenzy is a great skill don’t get me wrong… But other classes get things that are similar (AS I HAVE SHOWN AND YOU IGNORED!) Pistol whip thieves and Sword/dagger + Shortbow rangers 4 evades in two weapon sets and by the time a ranger uses all those evades his first one is back off of C/D (and they are buffing GS for rangers too look at that!) Mesmers reliable damage mitigation (the block from scepter/sword just block one attack and still leave us in melee therefore=/=reliable) is from blurred frenzy/Phase retreat/and distortion which is reliant on illusion management for max potential. And rangers are lucky their pets health bar is in plain view… Ours… We have no clue how close it is to dying or not. And for the love of god we have already had a nerf in the area of no summon on blind/invuln there is one nerf for you kitten. And in the current team set ups a necro is still going to be harder to kill than most mesmers (and a lot of necro’s run bunker builds) which makes them even harder to kill. And once again because of the lack of survivability in a team fight of a Mesmer bunker build (yes they exist) mesmers are pigeon holed into this build that everybody hates for tournies.

And Mesmer nullfield DOES NOT have the effect of the necromancer wells. The wells are WAY MORE POWERFUL because instead of just removing they convert… So instead of nullifying all a guardians boons bam they are all conditions and that guardian=dead.

No, the fact that every team require a Mesmer due to portal isn’t teamplay, it is just imbalance. Teamplay is when a profession plays a role that almost every profession can play, at least in Guild Wars 2, or it would be pointless to remove the holy trinity if now you need Mesmers instead of Monks in every team to have some chances.

Your illusions are, in the worse case, at 20s cooldown. Destroying an illusion thanks to a dodge roll isn’t that horrible if you can cast that illusion again in a matter of seconds.

No, you have shown that Rangers have evades, but, as I’ve pointed out and YOU IGNORED, Ranger evades lasts at best 1/2 a second. This means that to get the 2s invulnerability Mesmers have, they have to cast 4 of their skills. Now, sum all the cooldowns of those skills and look how Blurried Frenzy is imbalanced.

You still ignore the fact that you can summon a certain illusion every kittening 20s. Don’t act like you don’t know that. Who cares you can’t see the life bar of an entity which can be respawned few seconds later?

Mesmer Null Field has actually better effects. It removes multiple boons and multiple conditions per pulse, while the wells convert just one condition/boon and needs a trait to be casted from range, plus they have higher recharge.
This means that in the best case, 1-2 boons get converted, then the target will be most likely out of the well while, with Null Field, at worse case, you strip 3 boons (as I showed you in the video) and on a lower cooldown.
Null Field is 2 wells packed in one with less cooldown, which can be casted from range (1200 VS 900 of wells when traited) which removes multiple boons/conditions per pulse with the only downside that he does not convert them. Also, I think you should take a look at the boon converting tables in the wiki, because they aren’t exactly directedly converted.

The fact that Mesmers are pideholed in that build means again “imbalance”.
This can mean two things:

1. That build is too powerful compared to the others making the other ones not worth to be played.
2. Other builds are too weak to be played.

I think the first one is the case, feel free to believe the second one but, in both cases, the Mesmer is imbalanced.

jportell.2197:

Well here we are again this is going to be based off of MY experience because that is all I have to go on here… Thief yeah easy to play I’ll give you that….Mesmer not so… You are managing 3 separate entities while trying to manage yourself… It is by far the most active type of class I have played. More decisions are made in a fight than with any other class. Mesmer relies on a very active play style… And the only bad thing about what they demand for mesmers (GUESS WHAT PORTAL IS GETTING SHARED WITH ANOHTER CLASS HAS ALREADY BEEN STATED) is that it limits mesmers… And as far as illusion of life goes? A necromancer could easily bring signet of undeath and guess what that FULLY revives a player… Oh and they still have condition removal in their heal skill (very strong). Warriors can bring battle standard which still FULLY REVIVES teammates oh and they still have condition removal in their heal skill… In the current demand for mesmers we are left with no options to have condition removal… Us and engineers have none in our heal skill (unless the engi brings turret which I doubt they will) Every other class has it in their healing skill. And with kit refinement (if your team has an engi they are running this) cures two conditions upon equipping of certain kits and Med kit weapon skills have condition removal as well… So there again Mesmer has the worst… All a warrior has to do is use his healing skill and it clears two… And then they still have a signet if there are any left over… I know the designers have intended for mesmers to have a tough time with conditions because they have stated it. When mesmers say their weakness is conditions EVERYONE JUST IGNORES IT AND CONTINUES WITH THE OP BS. If warriors got better condition removal in their heal skill lets say All conditions with mending. Guess how much more OP they would become… They already have the hardest hitting skill in the game (and before you say oh use a stun break or dodge out of it just L2P) guess what that is the same excuse thieves use for their combos and mesmers as well… In order for null field to be truly awesome a Mesmer would have to trait for it in ways that would severely weaken them and he would do nothing else for his team.

Mesmers are easy to play.
You do not have to manage your illusions as you would do with your ranger to manage your pet, illusions are stupid are unmanagable, they spawn and hit their target till he is dead or they die. Don’t pretend you have to do a lot of mico-management which is not true. Illusions are casted and can be easily forgotten until you have to shatter them.

The fact that a Mesmer is mandatory in every tPvP team screams “IMBALANCE”. The fact that other professions have ress skills while not everyone have them says again “IMBALANCE”. It makes no sense to justify an imbalance with another imbalance.

Null field IS truly awesome. Just consider it has almost the effect of 2 Necromancer wells with less cooldown. The fact that you don’t use it or that you don’t use the torch with the condition removal trait, doesn’t mean that Mesmers are weak at removing condition or that they have no options to do so. There are some professions who are specifically designed to manage conditions and some other who have good condition removal, but this doesn’t mean that Mesmers have no tool to remove conditions and, to be honest, considering all the defensive capabilities mesmer have, it actually need some rework to be considered balanced.
For instance, Blurried Frenzy seriously need to be looked at. Shatter mechanic needs some tweaking too. Of course there are some builds which can use a buff, but don’t use it as an excuse to justify the builds which are clearly overperforming over the average.
Mesmers need their defensive capability to be reworked and, probably, to be more related to their trait to be truly effective.

Just to say, if you run a completely glass cannon Mesmer, you are less likely to die compared to (for instance) a glass cannon Necromancer, just because the Necromancer will just stay there in place taking all the damage because he has no tool to avoid them. This is the whole point.

ensoriki.5789:

Rezz.8019:

PD/PB mesmer, monks, magebane ranger players in GW1 had way better reaction times than any of the people in GW2 do. I guess PvP here is too easy and makes peoples brain less focused.

Don’t kid yourself. Due to quickness there are near nonexistent cast times on certain skills when up which you aren’t reacting but predicting. Similar happened in gw1 under an IAS but not as quickly since IAS were not as ludicrous. Fast casted skills could be fast as well but again were better grounded.

This man speaks the truth.
Back in GW1, interrupter did not actually have good reaction time, it was just a matter of predicting when the skill to iterrupt would be casted. Also, in Guild Wars, there was a clear skill bar appearing under the enemy’s life bar showing the skill casting time, which is something Guild Wars 2 does not have.

Same applies to infusers/prot monks. They just had to look at the enemies’ frontman and be ready when the spike will come, no infuser/prot monk was capable to prevent a spike by just looking at the life bars.

As for thieves, their spikes is comparable to watching to life bars as an infuser, because it starts instantly. That’s it. No visual clue, no thief walking toward the target, nothing. Teleport and spike.

Lukin.4061:

Yes, it actually is the same problem – a 100b war kills most of people that have just joined pvp, since they have no knowledge of how to counter them. Same goes for BS thief, same goes to almost any glass cannon build.

100b takes more than a second to be executed and you can clearly see the warrior bullrushing to you (or shield bashing, or throwing bolas). It means that the time you have to react is way, way higher.

So no, it isn’t the same problem.

jportell.2197:

Yeah and guess what in tourneys the team REQUIRES them to bring portal. So there is 2 utility skills and some teams require illusion of life… And the video you showed me was of boons that were already wearing off I set there and watched boons slowly disappear and I mean ALL boons (shout guardian remember) so no it is not instant and it works the same with conditions as well. So there again yes mesmers have the worst condition removal in game. And the fact that its stationary ground targeted AOE is what makes it a joke. If you throw it down in a pinch and you are still getting conditions applied then all you are doing is losing them as fast as you get them. Teams don’t make requirements for what a warrior brings the way they do for mesmers… Same goes for any other class… Except maybe signet of undeath if the team has a necro… Bunker Guards, Bunker D/d Ele’s, Warriors, rangers can all bring what they want as long as they do the job they intend to do on the team. Mesmers get requirements set for them on utilities and some teams require them to bring certain weapons as well because of the group utility of those weapons… So you are just as biased if not worse. Took my d/d ele into tournies (first time ever) I was able to sit there and dance around on a point while a thief a bunker guard and a warrior were all trying to get me off…. Please… I only wish that a Mesmer had a prayer of condition removal that good… All I had to do was use my healing skill and every 15 seconds poof all conditions gone… And that was IF I even needed my healing skill.

The fact that every team needs a Mesmer with Portal or Illusion of Life is another clear sign of imbalance, just saying. You want to play tPvP? You NEED a Mesmer in your team. This is stupid and, for sure, not balanced in a game like this.

This game is a complete mess when talking about PvP. Mesmer and Thieves are are the peak of the iceberg, but everything is flawed. Just look at how you are arguing. You are justifying a flaw listing other flaws. This makes no sense. All flaws need to be adjusted and Mesmers ARE NOT FINE just like Elementalists, Warriors, Thieves and so on. They need to be completely reworked, some builds are insanely stupid and powerful, some other are worthless, some mechanic just does not make sense.

Stop pretending Mesmer is weak or is not OP. Mesmer is imbalanced, most professions are imbalanced, but Mesmers are by far, with Thieves, the most hurting because they are extremely easy to play and to exploit.

This is creepy.

jportell.2197:

If people are having issues with FPS in PVP then they need a new machine. I have lag issues but when I have them everyone does so that is a server issue… And in that video the boons were going down right when null field was cast but hey lemme double check this. But in terms of raw damage even if it does remove the conditions we have to stay right in the middle of it which again (pretty big clue as to where we are) and if the Mesmer has this up he isn’t Spamming clones as much as you say because that means he doesn’t have either mirror images or decoy.

Edit: tested how null field worked on my buddy that is a shout guardian… Had him immediately use all shouts at once popped nullfield… it did not strip all boons at once… it did 1-2 per pulse… So I there for stand by that the targets and the mesmers have to stay inside the field for it to work and even then it may not remove all boons/conditions. SOOO I say again yes warriors have better condition removal because that signet is guaranteed condition removal null field is dependant on several other things (5target limit, stationary ground target, and not all at once, and the targets staying inside the bright pink circle)

And if I was able to record it for mr. Empirical up there it wouldn’t be based off my experience but just proof… However I don’t so yes this is my evidence like it or not.

I can’t argue with those conditions. Saying that you tested the skill on BOONS without checking the condition removal and just saying that it strips only 1-2 boons is pretty weak compare to the video proof I linked to you.

I can’t believe a random guy I met on the forum, expecially when I’ve seen that video that proves otherwise, and I probably won’t believe also a friend of mine if he just says something and I think that that thing is not true.

Who cares if you have to stay inside Null Field? Man, you completely ignored the fact that it’s AoE! AoE condition cleansing and boon stripping and you dare to say that it is unreliable? Seriously. You can’t be more biased.

Did someone ever told you that Mesmer have access to 3 utility skills?

jportell.2197:

Mesmer clones are meant to be spammed.. Phantasms can’t all phantasms have a cooldown whether they are killed out right or not its there… And I just made a necro did some hot join.. Guess what? Absolutely destroyed Mesmers extremely fast… Necro is scary good in PvP and death shroud needs some work sure but it isn’t as bad as you make it out to be and no warriors still have better condi removal then mesmers hands down no matter what you say. I know Mesmer is worse because I have seen warriors cleanse my conditions quite quick. And warriors have a signet that removes all conditions from them and that is on a 45s cooldown but guess what? IT REMOVES ALL CONDITIONS! Null field only removes one per pulse and arcane thievery IF it lands sends three to an enemy. So yes MESMERS HAVE WORST CONDITION REMOVAL IN THIS GAME… No passive like ele’s, rangers, or guardians get. No using them to your advantage like necros (necro’s can also send all their conditions to an enemy not just three.) I’d say after mesmers engis might have the worst but they have a trait where all elixirs remove conditions!

We fell back into the “my experience is a proof” argument.
Really, we should keep experiences (me and yours) away from this argument. They aren’t worth mentioning and they really don’t matter for the sake of discussion.

I never mentioned my experience, so you should.

Null Field is on the same recharge time as the signet. That skill also strips ALL boons on enemies every tick (http://www.youtube.com/watch?annotation_id=annotation_584011&feature=iv&src_vid=SnGmjNB24RU&v=SnGmjNB24RU#t=7m47s). I don’t know if it strips all conditions also, but it ticks 5 times, so I think that also if it cured only one condition, it would be enough considering the torch trait. Running Torch with Null Field grants you all the condition removal you need.

I did not wanted to make Death Shroud look bad, I just wanted to point out that Death Shroud isn’t properly a “second life pool” as you said.

Spammable visual confusion is a big deal in terms of defensive capability. It tricks the eyes, exploits the targeting system and plays on the PC performance (more entities, less fps).

jportell.2197:

One of your other points? Warrior still is able to remove a condition with a heal… I don’t care what you say they get 2 conditions in a heal before even touching traits or other utilites… Mesmers don’t right there warriors are better off then mesmers with regards to conditions. And also in the current meta teams would require mesmers to bring portal and maybe illusion of life (depending on what other classes are on the team) So that means that a Mesmer might have either one condition removal skill or none. If he is bringing a condi removal I know it won’t be arcane thievery the range sucks and it is buggy as hell… Mantra of resolve maybe but null field is most likely.. And in any team most Mesmer’s won’t have a reduced cd on the glamour skills so it will be at least 45 seconds before they are able to remove conditions again… and null field (like other glamour skills) is bugged out and only lasts half of its stated duration. So yeah I am gonna say it mesmers have the WORST CONDTION REMOVAL IN THIS GAME. And while I forgot to mention that necro minions don’t look like the necro he still has more of them than mesmers have of clones and minion AI is just as bad as clone AI (let me stand in one spot follow you and auto attack you. Also the minions have much higher health than any Mesmer illusion and can apply more conditions than any Mesmer illusion… And death shroud still builds gives them extra health while their heal skill may be on CD

1. Null field lasts 5 seconds, according to Wiki, which isn’t actually half 7s.

2. Mesmer does not have the worst condition removal in this game. Cleansing Conflagration and Null Field are far more than the condition removal skills that Warrior has.

3. Minion AI isn’t just as bad as Clone AI. Clones just attack the target they are summoned to and they do their job fine. Minions have to constantly change target and this is where they fail.

4. Minions can apply more conditions than any mesmer illusion? The only two minions that apply conditions are Bone Fiend (2s cripple every 10s, AMAZING!) and Flesh Golem (1s cripple, MORE AMAZING!). There is also Jagged Horror which lands about 2 hits in his whole life to apply 2 bleeds for 5s.
Now, take a look at Illusions.
- Phase Retreat (Winds of Chaos means 1s burning, 7s bleeding or 5s vulnerability plus bounce and boons)
- Phantasmal Mage (3s of confusion) plus retaliation
- Sharper Images (5s of bleeding on crit)
- Phantasmal Berserker (2s cripple per whirl hit)
Which is, in fact, more. Consider also that all those skills are weapon skills. Necromancer’s skills are utility.

5. Life Force has to be built and it is drained of 3% per second, which is quite a lot (about 7-8 stacks of bleed with quite high condition damage). Necromancer have no access to any of his skills while in Death Shroud, also. He has no access to stunbreaker and defensive skills too. He can’t see his conditions and his boons. So I wouldn’t call it a second life pool. Keep in mind also that more HP =/= more survivability. Look at Thieves or Elementalists.

6. You accurately ignored the recharge point I made. Mesmer’s clones and illusions can be spammed. Minions can’t.

jportell.2197:

And it sounds like you have gotten beat by one too many mesmers in a hot join match…The 10 second invuln doesn’t compare to a rangers evades or an ele’s mobility or a guardians defense. Necro’s get an entire extra life pool and they can have more minions up (for targeting sake) then mesmers can illusions. Now before you get all “NO NECRO WOULD EVER USE MINIONS IN TOURNEY” They have and they do… do you know why? Because they are a bunch of meat shields for the necro and his team. The incoherence in your arguments is just as incredible what should blurred frenzy and PR be on 40 seconds cooldowns and mesmers just stand in one spot and wave and say “hey im right here go ahead and wail on me” any AOE conditions will melt through the clones faster than they can be produced and also do a ton of damage to the Mesmer… Well who is really good at conditions? Nearly every class… Thieves, necros, eles, rangers, engis (omg do engis have good conditions most of which are AOE) and guardians have a bunch as well… All of which are great counters to the Mesmer clones… And a ranger can have evades on 3 of 5 skills using sword/dagger shortest being on a 15 second cooldown… But guess what while that cooldown is going he still has two more evades! And then he can swap to short bow and pew pew pew… Gues what? Short bow also has an evade! Crazy! The two seconds of invulnerability is good but nowhere near OP. And thieves can spam their evades one of which is an AOE bleed can you say bye bye clones? Oh and that skill also evades shatters… Warriors whirl wind attack as given me the “evaded” message before which is why I say they have them in weapon skills as well… But warriors still have the highest health and highest armor in game.. And they still have better condi removal then mesmers… So you know what no you won’t convince me that anything to do with our damage mitigation is OP because other classes are so much better off in areas where the Mesmer is lacking.

Sounds like you are grasping at straws.

1. You completely ignored the fact that Ranger evades lasts half a second or less. They are useful only to avoid one hit. 2s is actually 4x the average evade time of Rangers, that means you need 4 skills to get to the same amount damage mitigation of Blurried Frenzy. Do some math and get to your conclusions. You also ignored the fact that, other than those evades, Rangers haven’t any defensive mechanic left.

2. You forgot to mention that Minions have high cooldowns and that those cooldowns start counting after the minion dies. This means, just in case you don’t get it, that once minions are killed, they won’t be summoned again for a good while. You also forgot to mention that as opposed to mesmer’s illusions, Necromancer’s minions are flawed with many targeting acquiring and attacking problem (they often don’t attack at all). You forgot also to mention that minion doesn’t actually looks like the Necromancer.
You also forgot to mention that Death Shroud isn’t properly an extra life pool (you would have known that if you actually played a Necromancer).

3. You didn’t read the part where I said to keep thieves apart. Justifying an imbalance because another profession is imbalanced is plain stupid.

4. Warrior have high health pool, high armor, but almost no condition removal and no defensive mechanic at all. Saying that mesmers have poor condition removal when they have skills like Null Field, Arcane Thievery and traits like Cleansing Conflagration sounds pretty funny.

jportell.2197:

And then it is now on a 45 sec cooldown IF traited… You aren’t going to convince me that blurred frenzy is OP you know why? Because we don’t get anything else… We get no in weapon evades like thieves, warriors, and rangers. Non. not a single one… Engi’s even get something good with the knockback on their rifle… the staff skill is not an evasion it is a teleport.. That they have barely come around to fixing the bugs on… No more being stuck in walls! And that is a very high cooldown for that utilty skill (decoy)… And the torch is still a joke in pvp, but the buff to prestige was nice at least now if I wanna use the torch Im not just standing there for 3seconds while in stealth unable to dodge even.

Edit: And if you are ever at all confused by the clones… Then that is YOUR problem not the Mesmer… They don’t “Act” like us because they attack SLOWER than us. They don’t look like us (if we are using a dual weapon set) because they DONT HAVE THE OFF HAND WEAPON…. They don’t have buffs, sigils, titles, or boosts under their name…

Sure. 2 seconds invulnerability every 10 second is not OP because you have nothing else. The incoherency here is incredible.
Keeping the Thieves apart, where exacly are the Warrior evades? Also, Ranger evades lasts only half a second and (without considering the unreliable GS AA evade) most of them ranges from the same to higher cooldown compared to blurried frenzy.
Blurried Frenzy tecnically means you are capable to stay invulnerable 1/5 of the time. Not OP, you say.

Now add to blurried frenzy the visual confusion coming from clones, stealth and some teleports here and there. So, you have nothing beside blurried frenzy? Stop kidding, please.

About the clones, if I’m confused about the clones it isn’t my problem, it is what the profession is supposed to be, sadly.
Not every fight are 1on1, you have to think a lot of other things during the fight, you have no time to check the attack speed of an entity or offhand weapons (mostly on Asuras) that is going to be shattered in a matter of seconds and then spawned again. The whole picture of the mesmer is broken, it is fine they have visual confusion, but having really A LOT of visual confusion is just too much. Clones, stealth, teleports… Just those thing make the mesmer hard to target, but, like it wasn’t enough, they have also incredibly high damage and invulnerability for 2s every 10s.

Targeting in this game is not that good and seeing a bunch of entities looking the same bouncing all around the screen surely doesn’t help.

Really, I think you are seeing the whole situation with a sort of pink-blurred glasses.

Verdelet Arconia.6987:

1)not all rangers use traps, those are builds best suited for conquest maps only
2)rangers have the least amount of condition removal so that is our weakness,you can take a look at the list of condition removal at this website to confirm i’m not making baseless facts. http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Condition
3) pet AI is very incompetent,you can easily kite the pets as they need to be near you and stop in their tracks before attacking

You fell to his bait.

Kultas Sunstrider.9218:

sry u don’t deserve my time :} learn 2 play

Ok, you was sarcastic
Phew, I thought you was just dumb.

Kultas Sunstrider.9218:

I just wanted to say that I feel your frustration, OP, but then I read all these stupid comments coming from rank 10+ players that never played a tournament in their whole life complaining about how much stealth is overpowered or something like that, and I felt depressed. So many newbs… /facepalm
Btw this is an important and very frustrating bug, and if it is not a bug, then it’s a broken mechanic of the game. If I go stealth I don’t want to be hitted by chain spells that have been casted before stealthing

/sarcasm

Fixed this for you.
You wasn’t serious, right?

jportell.2197:

I’m going to list the defensive abilities that a Mesmer has on their weapons sets (thieves get an evade/movement in ever weapon set).

For straight damage mitigation (not interrupts or cc)

Mesmers have Blurred frenzy which is a 10s CD
Phase RetreatWhich is also 10s

THAT IS IT… We do have 2 blocks but they only block one attack and don’t hold for a period of time… For completely mitigating damage we have those 2… And they get kittened about quite enough… Mesmers usually will only have ONE stealth ability that lasts 3 seconds and is on a 30+sec cooldown. And for our distortion shatter to be effective we need illusions… And it is on a very long cooldown as well.

Like having invulnerability for 2 seconds every 10s plus a bunch of effimeral things which looks like the the Mesmer and act like the Mesmer isn’t enough survivability.
Oh, and you also have some incredibly high cooldown (40s) clone-summoning stealth oh-kitten/panic-button utility! Oh, yup, you were talking about The Prestige, but I wasn’t

If everything miss, just press F4 to save your kitten

Poor Mesmers, they definitely need a buff.

Gallrvaghn.4921:

There are some mechanics in certain skills that are very rewarding and too easy to pull off like Heartseeker (gap closer, can be executed consecutively because of initiative, decent damage, auto-heat seeking on target) i mean what more could you ask for?

Imagine thief’s Heartseeket with it’s damage (pre-nerf) to actually not auto-home-in to the target but actually work like how Backstab works wherein you need to be behind or beside your target in order to land the hit. That would have been awesome.

Imagine shatters dealing a lot more damage than they do now and also a larger aoe BUT does not home-in to the target and just explodes on the clones’ current position. That would have been awesome

Difficult to execute. But very rewarding if executed properly.

This.
But no more damage to shatters. Hell, just imagine 4k of spreaded AoE damage per clone. Nope.

mbh.8301:

3v3 what? 3v3 deathmatch? You think 3v3 deathmatch will be a better showcase of skill? Imagine every single match having at least one time warp and lots of rage because their noob teammates didn’t bring a res skill. Yeah. That definitely sounds fun.

You don’t even know why RA was a success in gw1. In gw1 you had to unlock all the other modes of pvp by winning a certain amount in RA. So people would win a bunch, unlock something where everyone was really tryhard and hostile then go back to RA where they were a certified cool kid. It had a low barrier for entry and could be repeated often without losing too much of a sweat. Overall, RA plays exactly like our one round “tournaments” do. You play, you win/lose, you play again.

If you have an issue with my comparison of hotjoin and RA then you can feel free to argue against what I said, but I don’t think anet has posted anything on the topic so you might have to actually come up with a post all on your own.

Everything you said is right.
Except one thing. The “Arena” part of Random Arenas.

This makes your whole point having no sense at all.

Don’t blame game imbalance to justify the absence of Random Arenas. They were a good way to casually enjoy PvP in GW1, maybe when you get tired of competitive PvP. GW2 hotjoin isn’t fun nor balanced nor Arena. This is the point.

Guild Wars 2 mechanics fixed all the flaws Random Arenas had back in GW1 (like no monk = lose), but, still, we have no Random Arenas yet.

I think that if they add back to the game RA, HA and GvG just like they was in GW1, the PvP would become the best of every MMO. Sadly, they are only adding PvE events, stupid tournament adjustments and custom arenas (?).

Man, they have to be extremely good at sinking a that promising PvP game like that.