Is Mesmer a good choice for a new player?

I've just jumped into the world of GW2 and fell in love with the theme and aesthetic of Mesmer! I know barely anything about the game, but from what I've gleaned off the internet it seems like Mesmer can be rather complex. I'm more of a chill player, who's not interested in pvp. I'll also be leveling with someone who's going Guardian! So my question is, would Mesmer be okay for someone like me?

Mesmer, Thief, Elementalist and Engineer are usually not recommended because they're really complex. However, if you like it you should probably go for it. Plus if you level a hard class first leveling anything else will feel like a breeze.

You have company… and a guardian, no less, a class that's easily build to support others. Because of this I'd say to go for it.

Mesmer was my first character years ago, and I used to get owned easily by enemies above my level or veterans, it took me long after 80 to find a build I could survive with, but nowadays it's quite different, I feel like a good tank (probably the only character I have with whom I'd dare go up against the legendary bandit executioner at melee range).

So, yeah, if you like the theme and have company, it'll work out for you in the long run.

Mesmer can be a relatively simple and powerful class if played right, and has becoming one of the fastest leveling class due to their utilities.

For beginners, go with the sword/sword, focus power as primary stat, and spam skill 2. That's all you need.

@Tanuki.5486 said:I've just jumped into the world of GW2 and fell in love with the theme and aesthetic of Mesmer! I know barely anything about the game, but from what I've gleaned off the internet it seems like Mesmer can be rather complex. I'm more of a chill player, who's not interested in pvp. I'll also be leveling with someone who's going Guardian! So my question is, would Mesmer be okay for someone like me?

mesmer has propably the highest skill ceiling of all classes, both pve and pvp.It has alot of issues, but currently in end game raids I believe it is the single best dps.

• it gets nerfed every single patch for years.If you like how mesmer looks/plays say fuck it and go for it, but if you have an eye on another class go for it instead, it will save you headache down the line.

Honestly post phantasm rework learning and leveling mesmer isn't anywhere near as hard as it used to be and is in fact super easy with all your phantasms one shotting non veteran mobs and Signet of the Ether resetting your super charged phantasms. Playing with a guardian can be a lot of fun especially because when they flush you with boons you can use Signet of Inspiration to extend their duration.

Seriously, GW2 has very easy PvE especially before you hit expansion content. The only class that I would advise not to role first is Engineer, and even then once you hit 80 you get holosmith which makes Engineer a lot more streamlined and easily playable. Even Elementalist, despite having 20 weapon skills, you're still largely sticking to fire and air in PvE. Mesmer is pretty similar.

When you hit 80 you can get some easy Berserker gear and run DPS chrono for open world and PvE while you work towards getting Diviner's Gear for Support Chrono, Viper's Gear for Condition Mirage, and Minstrel Gear for Tanking Support Chrono.

Is a solid damage orientated build when you hit 80 and unlock chronomancer.

https://snowcrows.com/raids/builds/mesmer/chronomancer/power%20boon/ Has the builds you want to work towards gearing and getting good at when you hit 80 and start doing group content like raids.

If you like the theme of mesmers play it. Simple as that.

Despite over 30% of my hours on mesmer since prelaunch (beta event) I honestly think you should play a different class to start. The main draw to playing mesmer , having clones draw aggro, is completely lost if you have a guardian supporting you. Shattering isn't that intuitive and chrono is one of the highest skill cap classes, even more so after the changed requirement of having a clone active. Without shatters you lose a lot of the potential even on core power mesmer and are relegated to spitting out phantasms which may die to cleave and AoE and are at the mercy of AI (similar to ranger pets and necromancer minions). The only time keeping clones up as a damage source is worthwhile is if you play condition builds.

Even if you get to the "endgame content" (fractal/strike/raid), you will be forced to swap because alacrity renegade is generally paired with quickness firebrand for the foreseeable future. If you play it as DPS then unless you have eternal sources of slow and your clones /phantasms don't die to random mobs and AoE you will never reach the damage numbers people keep citing. In reality holosmith engineer (which stacks vulnerability and has many CCs), soulbeast ranger (while flanking ; also provides spotter for party precision) , staff daredevil thief, and any sword weaver have more consistent damage due to not having that stipulation.

Luckily you're not interested in PvP/WvW as the situation is even worse over there.

Thank you for the insight and advice everyone, its really helpful! I think i'm going to give it a try, but if it comes to it i'll make some other professions to play around with too.

Start with mesmer, try power mesmer first it is harder than condi version. Do not use any defensive stats just go for full zerker. Try different skills/weapons and traits. With some time and effort you can learn it :) It is hard, true, but not impossible.

I started GW2 as Mesmer. If you never played MMOs or ARPG Mesmer would not be recommend. If you did, it is like any other class. No issues at all.

@Leonidrex.5649 said:

@Tanuki.5486 said:I've just jumped into the world of GW2 and fell in love with the theme and aesthetic of Mesmer! I know barely anything about the game, but from what I've gleaned off

• it gets nerfed every single patch for years.

That's a lie, just saying :D

That said, I wouldn't recommend it for new players, but that's nothing more than a personal preference, so you might as well try it.

It's extremely painful to level up, doesn't offer a lot of convenience to an inexperienced player. The playstyle is a little unorthodox in my opinion, it doesn't naturally flow like a Warrior or even Thief would. My first character was a Thief, I stuck with him for almost 7 years now. You have strong ranged options in the Shortbow, which is very useful tagging and clearing out groups of enemies. Then you have Dagger, which is the usual melee Thief type of deal. They don't have cooldowns, only a resource you have to manage, it's self explanatory.

@Sobx.1758 said:

@Leonidrex.5649 said:

@Tanuki.5486 said:I've just jumped into the world of GW2 and fell in love with the theme and aesthetic of Mesmer! I know barely anything about the game, but from what I've gleaned off

• it gets nerfed every single patch for years.

Actually its true.

@Sobx.1758 said:

@Leonidrex.5649 said:

@"Tanuki.5486" said:I've just jumped into the world of GW2 and fell in love with the theme and aesthetic of Mesmer! I know barely anything about the game, but from what I've gleaned off

• it gets nerfed every single patch for years.

https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/98220/game-update-notes-february-25-2020#latest -> nerfhttps://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/88856/game-update-notes-october-1-2019#latest -> nerfhttps://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/85599/game-update-notes-august-27-2019#latest -> bugfix nerf very minorhttps://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/84527/game-update-notes-august-13-2019#latest -> nerfhttps://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/81753/game-update-notes-july-16-2019#latest -> nerfthose are nerfs since I personally started playing. There were some more that I missed but its just nerf after nerf :Dlook at guardian, its just buffs and buffs and buffs, and IF they get nerfed they make sure to buff something else too, they even buff guard when there is bugfix patch only lol

@Blocki.4931 said:It's extremely painful to level up, doesn't offer a lot of convenience to an inexperienced player. The playstyle is a little unorthodox in my opinion, it doesn't naturally flow like a Warrior or even Thief would. My first character was a Thief, I stuck with him for almost 7 years now. You have strong ranged options in the Shortbow, which is very useful tagging and clearing out groups of enemies. Then you have Dagger, which is the usual melee Thief type of deal. They don't have cooldowns, only a resource you have to manage, it's self explanatory.

Maybe back in 2012 Mesmer sucked to level but now you can level up and go around literally one shotting enemy mobs with Phantasmal Swordsman, Phantasmal Disenchanter, and Phantasmal Berserkers, then cast Signet of the Ether and cast them all again.

A lot of people say mesmer is hard and not recommended for beginners but I liked the class from the beginning and mained it straight away and had no problems whatsoever. Just go for it if you like the class!

If you love the aesthetics, go for it!

Balance comes and goes, but sound and visual effects are paramount - otherwise we may as well all play with 2D stick figures in a monochrome box! xD

@Leonidrex.5649 said:

@Sobx.1758 said:

@Leonidrex.5649 said:

@"Tanuki.5486" said:I've just jumped into the world of GW2 and fell in love with the theme and aesthetic of Mesmer! I know barely anything about the game, but from what I've gleaned off

• it gets nerfed every single patch for years.

You listing multiple patches that nerfed the class doesn't mean it "gets nerfed every patch". Maybe you just mainly look at mesmer patch notes, but if you look at some other classes, it's easly not anything out of ordinary, so there's no reason to try and make it into some kind of martyr. :p

And I know they like to use "bug fix" as a "catch all" term, so sometimes they nerf things while labeling them as a bug fix, but the 3rd link doesn't seem like nothing more than an actual bug fix. And you know well you didn't post "every patch" :D

At Launch there was literally only 1 way to level a Mesmer without pulling your hair out and that was staff with traits that are no longer in the game.Nowadays it's much easier.

@Sobx.1758 said:

@Leonidrex.5649 said:

@Sobx.1758 said:

@Leonidrex.5649 said:

@"Tanuki.5486" said:I've just jumped into the world of GW2 and fell in love with the theme and aesthetic of Mesmer! I know barely anything about the game, but from what I've gleaned off

• it gets nerfed every single patch for years.

guardhttps://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/100269/game-update-notes-march-17-2020#latest -> nerfhttps://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/93364/game-update-notes-december-3-2019#latest -> buffhttps://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/90115/game-update-notes-october-15-2019#latest -> buff ( it was bugfix patch ) yet the buffed guard anyways :Dhttps://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/88856/game-update-notes-october-1-2019#latest -> buffhttps://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/81753/game-update-notes-july-16-2019#latest -> buffhttps://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/74356/game-update-notes-april-23-2019#latest -> buffhttps://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/70399/game-update-notes-march-5-2019#latest -> looks like buffs mostly, hard to tellas you can see in the time I played mesmer, my class got nerfed at least 6 times, while guard got buffed at least 6 times.should have made a guard lul

Why are you talking about guard? I'm not talking about guard and it's irrelevant, come on :lol:

And not to look too deep, where's the mesmer nerf in march 17 patch?

Mesmer can be an extremely complex class and it not being as archetypal or universal makes it strengths less intuitive than other classes. In that way, it's not a good class for new players.

On the other hand, Mesmer can be one of the most self-sufficient classes in the game, and sometimes just running in circles while firing your first Scepter ability to keep clones up can allow you to get through content that you would struggle with on other classes if you don't know what you're doing yet. In that way, it's a good class for new players.

My recommendation (this comes from personal experience) is to try it out, but if it's feeling too slow or you're just not getting the hang of it, or you're just getting sick of the game, consider that it might be the Mesmer not being a good fit for you and not the game, so try something else before you form a complete judgment.

As long as you fell in love with the aesthetics of it, ofc its okay for you, no matter how complex ...every class has some complexity to it anyways. period. :)

@"Tanuki.5486" said:I've just jumped into the world of GW2 and fell in love with the theme and aesthetic of Mesmer! I know barely anything about the game, but from what I've gleaned off the internet it seems like Mesmer can be rather complex. I'm more of a chill player, who's not interested in pvp. I'll also be leveling with someone who's going Guardian! So my question is, would Mesmer be okay for someone like me?

Are you going to level Mesmer up from level 1 to level 80 or use a booster (you get one when you buy PoF or purchase the latest expansion and it sold in Gem store) which jump you right into level 80 with some basic gear that you get in a chest (exotic)? As a long time Mesmer, Chronomancer and now Mirage player I would say invest first into unlock Decoy which give you a clone, stealth (as long you don't attack which then will force you out of stealth) and stunbreak. That way you can reposition yourself, get a small de-aggro off enemies (loose where you are until you attack) and can also run away (if you shatter your clone fast enough - your professional skill is shatter which add an effect from which shatter you use). Torch have a cleanse, stealth and burn (fire damage over time -> condition damage).

Get Sigil of Inspiration as you will have Swiftness rather often as that have high priority as one of your random boons. That sigil will interact well with Chaos traitline (increases duration for both boon and condition with 2% for each boon on you) and with Staffs Chaos aura and other stuff. It is a slow projectile from Staff, but with Phantasm from staff you will also bounce it between friendly (boon) and enemy targets (condition).

The most basic game mechanic, which everybody have to learn, is that you have to look into what type of boons that you have and what kind of condition you want to base your Mesmer and later Chrono or Mirage around. As an example: might increases damage both from Power (direct damage attribute) and from Condition Damage (condition or damage or over time effect -DoT). Combining or manipulating those two main position is the key to how Mesmer work in any form. Compared to Elementalist as an example where you are more focused in each element (fire, water, air and earth [attunement]) as base to what can do and also will get locked until cooldown have ended, meaning that need to know what weapon have what kind of skills available during that time while you are in that attunement and add to that you need also to have the right weapon as you can swap between two set of weapon. As Mesmer you only need to keep in mind which weapon set you have active when you summon clones or phantasm (phantasm are more a minion type of illusions that are dependent on which weapon you have to summon them).

Look into Torch as off hand (give you stealth and condi cleanse) and combo it with Main hand Sword (close range leap to target and return, short invulnerability, but you are also rooted during that animation - it is called Blur instead of Distortion which is part of trait line and your Shatter skill, so wont get any change when you invest in Sigils with Distortion improvement) or Scepter (it is a mid ranged condi weapon).

Blink (teleport) is a useful skill, especially when you use GreatSword (GS) as you get more damage the more range you have to target. You also have portals where you can help people get around in jumping puzzle or get back up if you fall down (it is a time and a distance limit from where you open portal to where make the end portal). Don't forget that reflects are independent on your own attributes, so a hard hitting ranged enemy with projectiles (it only impact projectiles) will have less chance on hitting you or the AoE where people stand in that you have put up.

Here is the full list of Mesmer/Chrono/Mirage skills and traits. (There are some tips for which traits that interact with weapon, utility and elite skills. On your bar you have from left side either 3 skills from MH (Main Hand) and 2 from OH (Off Hand), healing skill, 3 Utility skills and your elite skill. Don't forget that you change your keybinding in Options>Controls, so you don't have to have your professionals (F1-F4) far away from your other skills. In most cases you can place your skills where you access them faster then the default setup.

If you don't like your Mesmer/Chrono/Mirage, then you can use this character to farm as you have Bink which is good tool for getting from node to node, your illusions that can keep smaller enemies at bay when you collect items, so it is still a useful first character to learn the basics in how skills (weapon, healing, utility and elite), trait lines and professional mechanic (which is generally built around the same system - some have profession have another layout or control their pets with another key, but is is more or less the same idea behind it) interact. Later when you have access to gliding and mount things might change in the way you play your mesmer (or any other player character), but it is still useful to have portals, be able to reflect damage and all the skills that you can use dependent on situation. Being skilled doesn't mean that you have to find the perfect build (as some here in thread seems to think), but know when and what to use when you are out of combat and change as needed.

Good luck and happy eastern!

No. Unless you're strictly pve.