is my mesmer ready for explorables?

[crunk]

First let me say: I LOVE THIS GAME. I've been poopsockin' it pretty hard and friends and I just hit 80. We just started playing last week but we're pretty eager to hit the explore modes and farm up some shinies. I've read around the internet but most mesmer stuff is from a pvp perspective and, while I'll no doubt get into WvW, I'm more eager to play the high end pve. So, I was wondering if someone could take a look at what I'm doing and let me know if I'm on the right track. My plan here is to play support/dps.

I'm traited:

20/0/5/25/20

http://www.guildhead.com/skill-calc#...nbmG0VGGcaMVck


I just hit 80 so my gear isn't what you'd call amazing but its a full set of rare Carrion gear with Mercy Runes. I have an exotic Carrion staff with Corruption Sigil and an exotic Valk GS with a Battle Sigil. My jewelry is all masterwork Explorer's stuff for 30% MF.

Since staff and gs gears differently I decided to ignore precision to get more condition damage to try to maintain a balance between the two. I weapon swap a lot for Chaos Armor/Storm. My thinking is that Carrion gear would be good for this because it offers both and vitality - and I chose vitality over toughness because I'm pretty good at dodging shit but when I do fail and get some conditions I just fall flat on my face. We're all still pretty new at the game so I don't feel ready to go crazy with a Rampage or Berserker set and the Mercy runes are because we go down a lot and my friends are all toolbags and I find myself doing a good chunk of all the rezzing.

So, how I play it is this - I start in staff and get a warlock out, drop chaos storm and blink out for my 2nd clone. From there I sit in staff and dps until I can get a 2nd warlock. Then, I switch to GS and get max range. I use GS 4, GS 2, and Time Warp for the bumbaclot damage. 20-30 seconds later I'll switch back to Staff for another Chaos Storm and to get more warlocks out, and so forth. I try to use warlock phantasms as much as possible because they are ranged and live a lot better, plus the conditions and boons are nice. I don't often shatter for damage unless the phantasms are about dead but I make good use of daze and invulnerability shatters. For straight DPS pulls that I don't need utility I'll use Radiation Field to get more conditions, but those seem to be rare based on the few dungeons I've played.

I'm wondering, however, if I'm not shooting myself in the foot by not taking Sharper Images and stacking crit. I suppose I could go 20/15/0/25/10 and pick it up, but as it stands now we're already almost capping bleeds on long fights. The other thing I couldn't find any solid information on is how condition damage is calculated. My staff has condition damage on it, but my GS doesn't. If conditions are applied from staff but I swap to GS do they update and do less damage? or are they snapshotted like wow dots at the time they are applied.

Our group is thief/necro/ranger/guardian/mesmer(me!) in case you were wondering.

On champion mobs I've noticed that I can pull aggro between 10-15 people, so I guess the damage is pretty good, but I'm hoping some seasoned mesmers could give me some insight into what I can improve or if I'm just playing goofy or what. Thanks <3

[Meledelion]

Never go with conditions, especially as mesmer.

There are only two viable builds out there atm, shatter and phantasm, both use berserker gear. You can do explorables regardless of gear though so just go ahead.

[crunk]

well, i prioritize power over condition damage but since I'm using staff for its utility anyways and not using F1 as much (i suppose this is a phantasm build?) doesn't it make sense to have some condition damage to make staff illusions hit harder? I suppose I could use Valkyrie gear if not, but I don't think I'm good enough at not dieing to completely forego survivability for berserker gear.

[Meledelion]

You'll learn to survive with zerker gear. Too many people never dare to switch back or cba to get a "real" set after they're used to w/e they're rocking.

I wouldn't use staff at all, it's a sad excuse of a weapon.

You're using a mix of phantasm/conditions which is a bit silly. The added dmg traits don't work on conditions so those are a waste.

[crunk]

okay thanks ill rethink my gearing and drop a gold or 2 on a new set i appreciate the tips

[Deleted]

explo mode = green gear you buy in the TP worth 50 silver. nothing more is needed.

the most people really dont care what stats you wear as long you dont die all the time or do no dmg (WV gear *cough*). here and there are some people that want people with full beserker gear but there are still enough other people who dont care ^^.

i dont know if con. dmg works on illusions. i think they only get power through power ;p

your weapon choice also doesnt fit for con. dmg. instead of the greatsword you should take a scepter and a torch if you really want to stay on the con. route. (staff alone isnt enough for a con. build) you also should rethink your traits if you choose this way.

if you like your traits and your weapon choice, i would recommend you crit instead of con. dmg on your items.

oh an rethink your decoy ability. Blink is much stronger infight.


edit: and maybe you should transfer the 5 points in chaos to inspiration. the 15% more dmg for your phantasms are worth it.

[crunk]

yeah i hate the way scepter plays more than any other weapon, i went full zerker gear set with soldier's trinkets to stick with GS. as far as decoy goes, i put that there mostly as filler, i change my talents out so much encounter to encounter. but ill keep that in mind.

condition damage buffs winds of chaos dots, but their main attack is scaled off power, you're right. staff clones, that is.

i know most people say green gear is fine for dungeons but these are our first characters so every advantage to start them strong helps. it was a simple matter of grabbing 5g off the currency exchange and buying some starter gear. some people might call this pay 2 win but coming off 8 years of wow throwing 35 bucks at Anet for this awesome and sub free game seemed reasonable to me, and its not like I bought a legendary off the TP or anything. Or, like our ranger, a full set of exotics with mom's credit card (derp). i probably wont mind stepping into dungeons in 77ish greens on my 2nd character, but for a group of first timers the gear will help.

thanks for the input im excited to get in there now, hopefully tonight