Do you want new F1-4 shatters or a new F5 with the next elite spec?

Curious to see what people think. Even though PoF just released, this is the perfect time to come together and decide what we want to see in the next elite spec for mesmer, so gathering feedback on that.

I don't want an extra tacked on keybind - I'd rather have a replacement mechanic.

Replace them, but no F5, please.Side note: Shatters should've been replaced with something else for mirage tbh, but oh well.

Makes no difference, we don’t use the existing ones in PvE anyway, ok we do use distortion but we don’t use any other in a dps rotation.

@apharma.3741 said:Makes no difference, we don’t use the existing ones in PvE anyway, ok we do use distortion but we don’t use any other in a dps rotation.

Which could be changed with a new elite...

@FaboBabo.3581 said:

@apharma.3741 said:Makes no difference, we don’t use the existing ones in PvE anyway, ok we do use distortion but we don’t use any other in a dps rotation.

I don’t put much faith in could change especially after mirage. I mean mirage doesn’t even properly work with mesmer as phantasms do jack all for mirage.

I want new F1-F3. Distortion is too good to be replaced.

@apharma.3741 said:Makes no difference, we don’t use the existing ones in PvE anyway, ok we do use distortion but we don’t use any other in a dps rotation.

That's the thing, new shatters means we lose distortion. But I would still rather see new shatters. Give us a full on glass cannon spec

Well I don't want to have new shatters. I want a different mechanic / skills.

I feel like new F1-4 would be much more interesting than an F5 of any sort, coming with some built-in synergy with our previous Shatter Traits.

New shatters/profession mechanic would be awesome. If a thematic and design need warrants an F5 with it, then include that too, but of course not just for the sake of adding another button ... That would be silly.

@OriOri.8724 said:

@apharma.3741 said:Makes no difference, we don’t use the existing ones in PvE anyway, ok we do use distortion but we don’t use any other in a dps rotation.

Not necessarily. Look at dragonhunter or firebrand. Their F1-3 skills are replaced with something thematically similar. For instance, Virtue of Courage gets replaced by dragonhunter's Shield of Courage. Both grant Aegis but in mechanically different ways. A new shatter doesn't have to mean we lose distortion. It could just provide a new way of granting distortion.

@Allarius.5670 said:New shatters/profession mechanic would be awesome. If a thematic and design need warrants an F5 with it, then include that too, but of course not just for the sake of adding another button ... That would be silly.

Agreed. Don't add a new F5 unless it makes sense to have, but I'd really like to see something done with our F1-4 abilities with the next elite similar to, well, just about every other elite in the game.

Thinking ammo system for phantasm would be better that addressing F abilities.

@Cantatus.4065 said:

@OriOri.8724 said:

@apharma.3741 said:Makes no difference, we don’t use the existing ones in PvE anyway, ok we do use distortion but we don’t use any other in a dps rotation.

Technically you are correct, the best kind of correct. But when I say replace our shatters, I mean actually replace them. Not just give us outright better versions of them (which is exactly what DH virtues are). Think Reaper Shroud vs Death Shroud. Or for a more extreme example, think Scourge F-skills versus death shroud. Or Mark vs Steal. Completely new mechanics/skills, not just super beefed up versions of our core shatters.

I have a suspicion that scourge might be a 'proof of concept' for completely rebuilding a profession mechanic while keeping it compatible with traits that referred to the old profession mechanic. They probably didn't want to have two such experiments at once, but it does offer hope for a complete replacement of shatters in the future.

That said, the existing traits probably do place some limits on what that might be. For instance, consider Master of Fragmentation: that pretty much limits F1 to be something that can inflict critical hits, F2 to something that hits enemies, F3 to something that can be made an area of effect but isn't normally, and F4 to something defensive.

Either way, I am inclined to think that replacing F1-F4 has more potential to give the profession an entirely different feel than simply adding an F5 would be, however, awesome a well-used Continuum Split can be.

@OriOri.8724 said:

@Cantatus.4065 said:

@OriOri.8724 said:

@apharma.3741 said:Makes no difference, we don’t use the existing ones in PvE anyway, ok we do use distortion but we don’t use any other in a dps rotation.

I'd think completely new mechanics would make it even easier to incorporate distortion since that could be the starting point of one of the F-skills. Even still, keeping something similar with distortion doesn't negate how much different the rest of the shatters could be from the original. It'd still be three other skills that could be redesigned.

@draxynnic.3719 said:That said, the existing traits probably do place some limits on what that might be. For instance, consider Master of Fragmentation: that pretty much limits F1 to be something that can inflict critical hits, F2 to something that hits enemies, F3 to something that can be made an area of effect but isn't normally, and F4 to something defensive.

When they added Chrono, they added the slow for F5, so potentially new shatters could be incorporated with different effects. It'd likely make the trait a little more complicated and I could see it making Anet reluctant to change the shatters too much since it'd potentially mean revisiting any trait that interacts with shatters, but it's not necessarily undoable.

They have no clue what to do with shatters, they tried them to be so good by adding stuff to them in most of the trait lines, and even then they are still useless, that if they were gonna re do any of the shatters the would first need to review all the traits that affects them, snowball effect....

@Cantatus.4065 said:

@draxynnic.3719 said:That said, the existing traits probably do place some limits on what that might be. For instance, consider Master of Fragmentation: that pretty much limits F1 to be something that can inflict critical hits, F2 to something that hits enemies, F3 to something that can be made an area of effect but isn't normally, and F4 to something defensive.

True, they could grant a new set of effects for MoF. However, a lot of shatter traits, particularly in Domination and Illusion, are of the form "Shatter skills inflict (bonus effect) on hit" - so I doubt we'd ever be likely to see a function bar that doesn't involve skills that inflict hits.

However, there's still opportunities for significant changes in there.

For one relatively easy example, for instance: Imagine a mesmer whose theme is that they attempt to maintain their illusions up at all times (y'know, like often happens in PvE). Instead of destroying their illusions when they shatter, their skills are focused around working with their illusions.

For instance, the F1 skill could redirect all of your illusions to a single target. The next hit each illusion makes benefits from your on-hit shatter traits. (If you have Master of Fragmentation, the bonus to crit chance affects the entirety of the next skill used by each illusion, making phantasms much more likely to crit.)

F2, on the other hand, causes each of your illusions to retarget to a different enemy, if available, prioritising enemies with higher health, allowing the mesmer to preserve illusions if the focus target is about to be killed. The next hit for each illusion benefits from on-hit shatter traits.

F3 simply grants the mesmer an on-demand ranged daze, independent of illusions. With Master of Fragmentation, it affects enemies around the target. On-hit shatter traits apply to the attack made by this skill.

F4 is a Distortion - it balances out not consuming illusions by having a short duration (two seconds, say, so equivalent to using Distortion when you have one illusion out). Given that Inspiring Distortion exists (as a minor trait, in fact), it does seem that ArenaNet would probably want to make sure that distortion is always present on the mesmer so that they always at least have the chance of benefiting that.

These proposed changes are relatively minor in terms of how they interact with traits - in fact, the recharges of these skills might be the same as the present equivalents. However, it would have a substantial effect on how the hypothetical elite specialisation played.

@Nowaki.2136 said:They have no clue what to do with shatters, they tried them to be so good by adding stuff to them in most of the trait lines, and even then they are still useless, that if they were gonna re do any of the shatters the would first need to review all the traits that affects them, snowball effect....

Honestly, I think the problem with shatters more comes down to phantasms. In most situations, the best DPS comes from summoning three phantasms and then using other attacks and utilities (and avoiding using ones that summon clones). It isn't worth throwing away three phantasms for a shatter, particularly F1 and F2 which are meant to be damage based and not a worthwhile trade. Chrono at least is able to incorporate shatters some due to Continuum Split and Chronophantasma but that's only because he can use shatters and still keep the phantasms.

If they are going to come up with a new sort of shatter for a new elite, the only way people will use them is if they aren't actually shatters and you don't lose your phantasms. Otherwise, it's doubtful they could come up with something that good that it'd be worth throwing them away without simultaneously being overpowered. That, or the spec will have to have some different mechanics with phantasms (eg can only have one phantasm at a time) so shatters don't feel detrimental to dps. And, really, that's what I want to see. I think shatters are an interesting mechanic. I want to feel like I can use them.

If not, we're going to end up with another spec like the mirage. Instead of addressing the issue with shatters and phantasms, they chose to come up with something that basically ignores them completely. And as that has shown, adding new mechanics on top of those rather than actually incorporating them results in people ignoring much of those just as much as shatters, ending up with a slightly different mesmer rather than an actual, unique spec.

@Cantatus.4065 said:Honestly, I think the problem with shatters more comes down to phantasms. In most situations, the best DPS comes from summoning three phantasms and then using other attacks and utilities (and avoiding using ones that summon clones). It isn't worth throwing away three phantasms for a shatter, particularly F1 and F2 which are meant to be damage based and not a worthwhile trade. Chrono at least is able to incorporate shatters some due to Continuum Split and Chronophantasma but that's only because he can use shatters and still keep the phantasms.

To be honest, I think this is a large part of what makes chronomancer awesome for regular PvE. You CAN shatter occasionally, and in fact, if you time it right, it can actually increase the efficiency of your phantasms as well. If you don't go crazy, you can usually have your phantasm-summoning skill recharge by the time you actually wipe the phantasm (even with the nerf to Persistence of Memory).

Replacements would be enough, if they would do an additional fifth shatter it would kinda go overboard. Chrobo has its place with its additional shatter (extended class mechanic) , mirage has the mirage cloak mechanic (additional class mechanic) and the new E-Spec should have new shatters or something that replaces them entirely (change class mechanic).

Frankly I dislike the idea of stapling extra buttons onto classes with elite specs. They're supposed to be transformative, not additive. Some elite specs (Reaper, Scourge, Holosmith, Deadeye) do this really well, others (Berserker, Chronomancer, Druid) really badly.

Yet, if the game cannot handle providing meaningful experiences with elite specs without resorting to extra buttons, then if anything this points to an underlying issue with the weapon + healing + 3 utility + elite constraint which is constantly worked around with f-buttons. So maybe that would need a change intead.

Instead of having a shatter mechanic that makes clones and phantasms run to a target, why not have the clones and phantasms run to the summoner and give different effects ?

Ever since Chrono and DH were the first two revealed elite specs, I wanted Chrono to have new F1-F4 instead of an F5 tacked on. I've mentioned more than a few times that CS should have been the new F4 for Chrono. Chrono F2 should have been torment instead of confusion because confusion/slow don't work too well together. Master of fragmentation aoe bonus on F3 could have added aoe quickness/slow to F3 instead of daze. Signet of illusions could be a problem but they could also change it to reduce all shatter CD by 25-30 seconds. Prevents it from instantly refreshing CS but still keeps the signet functionality intact for the most part.

Mirage F1 could have been ambush instead of doge/1 activation. F4 gives mirror mirage. Mirror mirage recharges F1. Maybe ammo mechanic on F1 ambush. F3 retargets illusions. Basically mirage F1-F4 could not destroy illusions and instead act more like ranger F1-F4 by controlling their illusions actions and retargeting them.

Like chrono/mirage are ok. I don't think they are particularly OP/UP but after so many years of mesmer shatters/illusions that feel penalizing to use, the new elite specs just don't change up enough to make it feel new. Other classes/elites have hit the spot for me so I can't complain. I'm sure a lot of people are happy with them but I really hope whatever a new mesmer elite spec does, it shakes things up a lot.

@DuckDuckBOOM.4097 I agree with you, I think that replacing the 4 shatters is a healthier option, for much the same reasons you wrote out. It reduces power creep (theoretically, they could still be ridiculously OP I guess), doesn't increase the number of keybinds we need to play the elite spec, and also does a significantly better job of changing the feel of the class. However I made this poll to see what the community at large thought, and I'm glad to see that they overwhelmingly agree with this viewpoint. Hopefully Anet sees this and takes it into consideration when designing our next elite spec