Mesmer Discussion Thread

[zito]

Is this playstyle going to get me in trouble later on?

Only if you suck at it.

If you are staying sword/sword and only use greatsword for pulling you are basically ignoring half the games skills given to you.

[sorude]

Only if you suck at it.

If you are staying sword/sword and only use greatsword for pulling you are basically ignoring half the games skills given to you.

Care to elaborate a bit on how to use greatsword effectively?

I'm currently using the 'full melee' sword/sword, sword/focus build from a few pages back. I want to give s/s, greatsword a try but I don't really know how to tailor the traits.

[Nikijih]

Sword/Sword seems just...ok. The block is really lacking compared to Temporal Curtain or Trick Shot and the Swordsman doesn't seem as useful as the Duelist or Berserker.

Sword offhand is better used with scepter main hand. Those blocks can crit for 3-4k in PvP. 2 of them can really shit on a rogue/warrior's day.

[Cempa]

I started a new Mesmer and was about to give up until I came across the below, it literally transformed my gaming experience from brutal to really fun because some players -like myself- are into ranged control/kiting builds:

http://www.teamparadigm.net/guides/M...smer-PvP-Guide

http://en.gw2codex.com/build/13656-b...nament-focused

The music is also awesome!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...&v=7GanJbGbHMw

[Deleted]

The music is also awesome!

Yeah, so awesome that the movie is blocked in my country.

[ayimera]

I started a new Mesmer and was about to give up until I came across the below, it literally transformed my gaming experience from brutal to really fun because some players -like myself- are into ranged control/kiting builds:

Thanks Cempa! Which one do you like the best from Enshadowed's builds or Blowi's gs/staff combo?

[Cempa]

GS/Staff amazing game play, the control is superb!

[empyblessing]

So after a few days of problems logging in, I can finally post. Woo.

I wanted to share my thoughts on mesmer after playing one since launch. Starting with the staff, I have to say it's my favorite weapon. I leveled a lot with it and used in wvw. All the buttons are very useful. I didn't understand the damage of a staff for awhile. For world bosses and veterans the staff is the highest damage I've found. The phantasmal warlock does increased damage based on the number of unique conditions on the target. If a boss has a lot of conditions on it the warlocks hit hard. It's also a good defensive weapon. The problems with the staff is the high set up time to deal good damage. Against a single target while leveling it's not the best damage.

I found myself switching out to my sword/sword combo for damage too often. Eventually I changed the sword for a pistol because with sharper images (bleeds on crit) the pistol phatasm was doing more damage than the swordsmen and staying alive longer because of the range.

I soon realized that staff is great but it's not very efficient at grinding mobs so I respecced to all precision and power damage, dropped the staff and picked up the greatsword and sword/pistol. I haven't looked back. It's the best damage while leveling I've found.

The greatsword is most useful for large packs as each of it's abilities can hit multiple targets except it's autoattack.

I forgot to mention the specter/torch combo I ran for awhile. It worked as I had a confusion build but the problem with it is that the damage is not good unless the enemy is spamming spells. Against a monster with a slow hitting charge up spell it was too low against a fast attacker like a mosquito it did a lot of damage. The problems I found with the scepter have been mentioned before but I'll reiterate. The clone spawn on the autoattack is usually more of a hassle than a help since the clones will replace your phantasms. I would like to see a change where phantasms were always considered priority over clones so the autoattack would spawn a new clone only if it wasn't going to replace a phantasm. If there were no phantasms it could replace the lowest health clone.

Overall the class has been fun to level. I felt like it was the weakest around level 20 but picked up again at 60. I didn't mention all the utility it has but it has a lot. There are so many useful spells that it can pick up. Feedback can be life saving against deadly ranged mobs of which are there plenty in dungeons and time warp is like a little aoe bloodlust. The class is good and lot of the weapons have their niche which I think is a great design. There isn't a best weapon overall but a best weapon for this situation.

[Deleted]

I guess I was playing it wrong, I found it too squishy for my liking, so i'll stick with my Engi+Guardian

[Nikijih]

The mesmer issue: Mantras.

Mantras are, for me, much too weak atm. After playing around a bit, I can safely say they are not worth the few trait points put aside for them.

Numerical mantras are about as powerfull as regular skills. Why is that? The long cast time and "recharging" system hint at a skill that would be more powerfull (hit/heal harder) then others, but at the cost of needing to be recharged. Instead you are left with a skill that needs many seconds casting to recharge but packs no more of a punch then a 8-10 sec CD regular weapon skill, if it does that.

I understand that the idea would be that they are balanced by being usable while channeling something else, but the truth of the matter is: this is GW2, not WoW. Battles are not resolved in 1-2 GCDs here. To save a GCD in a twitch game would be a great asset, I concur, but in this game its simply not important. One GCD rarely makes or break a fight in GW2.

[DrakeWurrum]

You realize that each charged mantra can be used twice, right? Thrice, if traited. O_o

[Nikijih]

I guess I was playing it wrong, I found it too squishy for my liking, so i'll stick with my Engi+Guardian

Acutally Mesmers are the class that can hit the highest damage reduction in the game. 50% from Defender, 33% from the protection trait combo (Phantasms give regen, regen gives prot), 9% from illusion-active trait. Of course you have to build specifically for it, and the gameplay does turn a little boring (fire-and-forget phantasms while dodging damage), but in PvP if anything targets me instead of my phantasms, the joke is on them!

---------- Post added 2012-09-11 at 10:19 PM ----------

You realize that each charged mantra can be used twice, right? Thrice, if traited. O_o

So? Mantra of pain x3 doesn't do as much damage as a single use of sword's #2 skill or scepter's #3. Mantra of healing x3 does not heal as much as our baseline one. Both have the extra drawback of being essentially usable only once per fight. The stun or daze Mantras are fine, but the damage and healing ones dont pack nearly enough of a punch to justify the extra "cons".

EDIT: keep in mind that mantra traits require mantras to be recharged. What this means is that not only can you only use it once, but once you do you essentially lose trait points for the rest of the fight.

[DrakeWurrum]

So? Mantra of pain x3 doesn't do as much damage as a single use of sword's #2 skill or scepter's #3.

Point? Sword #2 requires you to stand there and channel it, while doing the damage, and you can't use it on a moving target.

[Deleted]

So? Mantra of pain x3 doesn't do as much damage as a single use of sword's #2 skill or scepter's #3.

But you can pop Mantra of Pain while channling Blurring Frenzy and popping Mind Wrack IIRC. Some pretty nice burst damage while being invulnerable.

[Nikijih]

Point? Sword #2 requires you to stand there and channel it, while doing the damage, and you can't use it on a moving target.

Sigh, it was just an exemple (you have many ways to stop a target, none to recast mantra faster in combat, so lets not go there). The idea is that the damage is pathetic. Its just not high enough to turn a tide in a fight, barely above auto-attack damage, but with only 2 charges (which are usually used back-to-back because they are not powerfull enough on their own to do the job they are meant to do: bursting something down). After those charges are gone, recasting it in combat becomes completely counter-productive, because the cast time will cost you more damage then both charges will produce combined.

The healing one is in the same situation. A single charge heals for about 3k in sPvP. That is one single hit. I can do that twice, and then im out of luck because, once again, I would take more damage while casting (cant dodge) then the charges will heal back, making it un-chargeable in combat. Meanwhile the low healing means that when healing is required, once again, both charges are simply used back-to-back, making a mockery of the very mechanic in place.

The issue is that the con is huge (being only able to use them once) while the pro it was supposed to be balanced with is useless in GW2's current TTK environment (saving 2 GCD per fight by casting while channeling). This is why damage and healing numbers need to become a pro of their own: if I can only use them twice per fight, they need to be made so that they make a bigger impact when used then other similar skills that can be used consistently on low CDs.

---------- Post added 2012-09-11 at 10:41 PM ----------

But you can pop Mantra of Pain while channling Blurring Frenzy and popping Mind Wrack IIRC. Some pretty nice burst damage while being invulnerable.

Re-read my last posts, i explained this: TTK in GW2 is much longuer then what people are used to. Saving 1 GCD doesnt actually make much of a difference. People wont die in a single burst, so being able to compact that burst 1 second tighter dont actually change much in the grand scheme of things.

[Mistral]

It might be better to compare them with other utility skills though. This way it should be easier to rate their powerlevel.
If they're inferior to the other options than there is indeed need for change.

I don't know personally, as I sadly don't have the slot space for my own mesmer yet. =<
Just skilling diplomacy here! *hide in the shadows*

[Nikijih]

It might be better to compare them with other utility skills though. This way it should be easier to rate their powerlevel.
If they're inferior to the other options than there is indeed need for change.

I don't know personally, as I sadly don't have the slot space for my own mesmer yet. =<
Just skilling diplomacy here! *hide in the shadows*

Unfortunatly one of the issues with Mantras is that they cannot be objectively valued, because their value directly depends on the lengh of each encounter. Facing a 20 seconds 1v1? Mantras will compare very nicely. Facing a 4-5 minutes team fight? Your mantras are a waste of space.

Thats because, as I tried to explain earlyer, the casting time makes it counterproductive to even try charging in combat, because the casting would cost you more damage/health than what you are trying to gain. This is directly due to low damage/healing numbers.

[Fenlnir]

On longer fights, I've still found mantras to be useful, especially with the 3x use. But I only use the heal, with my other slots being the invis/clone, aoe rez/double phantasm and blink. I've also been running around almost pure melee (thus the spells). I might have to try out the damage mantra again just to see, but it worked pretty well when I did use it. Only issue I ever have with mantras is the charge up.. I don't ever mind charging them up out of combat, but I can't dodge and charge them back up, which kind of annoys me.

[criTix]

Scepter/Pistol is more for condition builds. Watching those big warriors/guardians kill themselves in 2-3 skill uses is funny. Takes a little setup, but it's relatively easy to get confusion stack to 15+

I didnt find a build to stack a 15+ confusion yet...

can you give me some tips ?

thank you

[Geist19]

Finally got a hold of the game, was excited to roll my Mesmer. By level 4 I was disinterested. The phantasm skills should be instant, would make the flow of their combat better and feel worth it before they die so quickly. In my opinion at least.