Ambush Skills

Hi! I'm new to mesmer and I've been trying out mirage in open world the past couple of weeks. So far, it's a really fun class to play, but it's a bit complicated and I don't know all of the angles yet. So, to start out, I was wondering if any of you more experienced mesmers could share your thoughts on the various ambush skills available to mirage. Pros/Cons, bugs that may not be obvious, etc. Whatever you want to share to get the ball rolling! There is probably a lot of mesmer "common knowledge" that I'm still ignorant of.

Ambushes generally are just slightly upgraded auto-attacks.Ambushes are a lot stronger with the trait Infinite Horizon, which also makes clones perform them. Building around this, you will want to have 3 clones up for most of the fight instead of phantasms.

The only Ambush that really stands out is Mirage Thrust (Sword).It can be used to move around and daze an enemy (this is a lot more relevant in pvp).

As far as problems go,

• Staff Ambush's main problem is that the attack goes in a straight line, which makes it easy to miss, should the enemy move
• Axe's Ambush just goes for random enemies, but can possibly hit twice if you are standing on an enemy (expect this to be fixed soon)
• Scepter Ambush will lock you in the animation

To me, ambushes are rather disappointing. They are all simply terrible in PvE, with the staff and sword ones being close to being decent. Traiting IH helps, but without it they are worthless.

1) Sword - probably the best ambush for PvP, not so much in PvE. It gives you great mobility, interrupts and deals some damage. What it needs is a damage buff in PvE and it will be fine, I guess?

2) Staff - the most beautiful, but at the same time the clunkiest one. It has good effect, but it rarely hits anything constantly moving. It also has terrible anti-synergy with Projectile Reflection (e.g. Mirror), as you are going to reflect its projectile, gaining no benefits and sending said projectile into oblivion (edit: to clear up, this happens when you use IH and stand in front of your clones casting the ambush. The ball won't pass through you, it will get reflected back).

3) Scepter - quite nice single-target-condi-damage wise. Other than that, it's horrible. It brings nothing new to the scepter on top of being long-channeling skill and dealing very little power damage. Personally, I'd trade some of its condi damage if it was changed into faster attack with more power damage, optionally with a little bit of aoe.

4) GS - it deals some power damage and stacks vulnerability nicely. It rocks at tagging many enemies at once too. However, it's extremely boring. It uses the same animation as the autoattack, which makes it look as if Anet didn't put much thought into it. Also, it really needs much higher damage in pve.

5) Axe - it's pretty and has fast cast time. If they fix the bug (?) which makes this skill hit your foe twice if you stand next to it, the ambush will become very weak (in PvP, cause in PvE it's very weak right now). The axes released by this skill are projectiles, so they can be reflected. Also, if you trait Mirrored Axes and IH, the ambush cast by you will release 3 axes, however the ambush cast by your clones will still release only 2 axes (probably a bug).

Mirage Thrust is actually quite bad in PVE because you are more likely than not to leap into the attack you were looking to avoid in the first place.

Otherwise, I usually see Ambush skills as a bonus burst of damage while I'm evading damage. There are builds that have been successful at integrating Infinite Horizon as their main damage source, but I personally haven't been impressed with the outcomes so far.

I've always been impressed with GS ambush (as well as others), because of how bright and prominent the rays are

Thanks for the replies!

Mirage does seem to have more than it's share of bugs and quirky behavior. Hopefully they can fix them and find a way to balance mirage while strengthening ambush skills to make them more worthwhile. I really do enjoy builds using self-deception and IH to push out clones and use ambush and shatter skills. It's fast and fun and the damage seems pretty strong for a mesmer. But weak and buggy ambushes take some of the fun out of it.

I also love the greatsword ambush animation. I'd say it's the best-looking ambush. Although axe and staff look cool, too.

So let me ask you guys, what weapons do you prefer in open world?

Also, what can you guys tell me about the timing on various mesmer abilities? For example, if I shatter, but one of my clones is at range and crippled so it takes forever to reach the target, what happens if I summon new clones? What happens if I shatter again? That sort of thing. I ask because I wasn't able to come close to the raid benchmarks I've seen tossed around here and I figured it must be that I'm not understanding how some of these abilities interact, resulting in lost DPS.

For zergs I use Greatsword and take Infinite Horizon. This lets you tag more reliably while farming in large groups.

My preferred play styles are Staff and Axe/Torch.Take Deceptive Evasion to get all your clones out quickly and keep them active at all times. I vary my between Infinite Horizon and Dune Cloak depending on what I am doing/my mood. Dune cloak is amazing because it is a free 20% condition duration (if the enemy is bleeding, and it always will be) which means Axe/Torch Torment and Burning are 20% stronger.

But I also like to run staff, stack my clones in one spot, dodge (activating Infinite Horizon) then stepping forward to make all my clones' Chaos Vortexes pass through me. Meaning I always have Fury and 25 stacks of Might, just from myself, while putting out a ton of Confusion and Torment.

The cons to staff are that the projectiles Chaos Vortex creates travel across the ground. Meaning they will fall off ledges and be useless. My only complaint with Axe is that there is an obnoxious delay on Lingering Thoughts between pressing the button and it casting. Same with Axes of Symmetry, but more annoying because it some times throws you/your clones a million miles away from your target or turns your camera away from them.

As a closing note I highly recommend eating Bowl of Orrian Truffle and Meat Stew. That +Vigor makes your endurance recharge incredibly quick. It works best with Infinite Horizon, as you can just keep dodging and dodging to pump out conditions and stay alive while doing it.

Don't ever take Deceptive evasion as a Mirage. You have so many clone generation skills that you'll never not have a clone out. Also, if you don't use phantasms, don't take Dueling either.

Here's a clone shatter build. It pumps out clones constantly and you can shatter them pretty constantly too. Every shatter, and most of the skills apply confusion so after a combo (and depending on if all your clones do the ambus, sometimes they don't - it's a bug), you can have around 30 stacks of confusion on an enemy. Deceptive evasion pales in comparison to Mirage trait Self Deception and Jaunt combo. IT will make you make another clone as long as you have at least one out and use a deception skill (such as jaunt).

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vhAQRAna7anELD1LjNoBWoBMMjlhjyMA2sGCd0KtTzf67+vH-jBSoABfp/JmnUAAqC8maP1s/gMnUBJVC+nyv1BIAnr5aumr5O35O3H4AH4AH4AGgDM35eg5O3DcgDcApAgZnG-e

Here's the go to combo that you'll be spamming for most of the PvE.

• axe 2
• axe 2
• jaunt
• axe 3
• axe ambush
• swtich to scepter
• scepter ambush
• scepter 3
• F2 shatter

Bam! Confusion like hell. And you don't need dueling because that favors phantasms that you have out all the time and don't shatter. You'll be shattering clones constantly.After this combo, when you're in scepter cooldown you can put out illusionary duelist, and when you use your heal skill, and jaunt or crystal sands, you'll have another 2 clones out instantly that you can shatter again with F1 or if needed with F3 to break the defiance bar.

Don't ever take dueling if you're not playing with phantasms. It's just not that worth it. Sure it has some ok traits, but you won't be getting the most out of it.

@Veprovina.4876 said:Don't ever take Deceptive evasion as a Mirage. You have so many clone generation skills that you'll never not have a clone out. Also, if you don't use phantasms, don't take Dueling either.

Here's a clone shatter build. It pumps out clones constantly and you can shatter them pretty constantly too. Every shatter, and most of the skills apply confusion so after a combo (and depending on if all your clones do the ambus, sometimes they don't - it's a bug), you can have around 30 stacks of confusion on an enemy. Deceptive evasion pales in comparison to Mirage trait Self Deception and Jaunt combo. IT will make you make another clone as long as you have at least one out and use a deception skill (such as jaunt).

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vhAQRAna7anELD1LjNoBWoBMMjlhjyMA2sGCd0KtTzf67+vH-jBSoABfp/JmnUAAqC8maP1s/gMnUBJVC+nyv1BIAnr5aumr5O35O3H4AH4AH4AGgDM35eg5O3DcgDcApAgZnG-e

Here's the go to combo that you'll be spamming for most of the PvE.

• axe 2
• axe 2
• jaunt
• axe 3
• axe ambush
• swtich to scepter
• scepter ambush
• scepter 3
• F2 shatter

Bam! Confusion like hell. And you don't need dueling because that favors phantasms that you have out all the time and don't shatter. You'll be shattering clones constantly.After this combo, when you're in scepter cooldown you can put out illusionary duelist, and when you use your heal skill, and jaunt or crystal sands, you'll have another 2 clones out instantly that you can shatter again with F1 or if needed with F3 to break the defiance bar.

Don't ever take dueling if you're not playing with phantasms. It's just not that worth it. Sure it has some ok traits, but you won't be getting the most out of it.

I more or less use the combination you recommend for axe. But I use staff instead of scepter in open world. I like the mobility, the ambush seems decent (albeit a little slow), and axe 2 spam on a chaos storm seems to produce really nice confusion burst on top of the usual combo. I also dislike scepter. It's mostly single-target, the ambush animation takes forever even if the damage seems strong, and I hate the block-and-counter move on scepter 2.

So far I've been working with either chaos/dueling/mirage or illusions/dueling/mirage. Dueling seems to produce better burst (likely due to ineptitude and blinding dissipation adding blind with confusion stacks to every shatter and interrupt). Chaos seems much more survivable, but the shatter burst is noticably less.

What do you recommend? I'm not running any phantasm-related traits out of dueling, but maybe there is still a better choice?

Either chaos or domination cause both provide good buff to shatter skills. I chose chaos because it gives you boons when you shatter and converts toughness to condition damage. If you pair that with trailblazer or dire gear it's a bigger damage buff than anything dueling gives you for shatters. Dueling is simply really bad for shatter builds because ot gives you sustain buffs (the longer they're alive the better the damage) which clones can't do, phantasms do that, and dueling gives you precision and ferocity buffs that condition builds fon't need because conditions can't crit. Sure a phantasmal duelist can cause bleed on crit and durling is great for that but only if younl keep 3 of them alive all the time and use viper's or sinister gear.

Oh, and about the staff, it' ok, but staff is a power weapon, not a condition weapon. I know axe 2 creates a combo field of confusion with chaos storm but chaos storm has a looooònnngg cooldown and staff ambush is really bad, it almost always misses...

Meanwhile, if you pick the chaos trait line, the first tier trait, Descent into madness creates a chaos storm if you take fall damage or heal of you're below treahold so if you use scepter you actually can have a chaos storm in addiion to the amazing scepter ambush and scepter 3 that also creates confusion.

Staff is just "meh" all around, it's slow and clunky and the phantasm it creates scales with power which you don't have as a condition build so idk.. It's usable and staff 2 mobility is great, but other than that it's kinda bad. You get more damage out of scepter than waiting for chaos storm to cooldown so you can combo axe into it.

And as i said, you don't need staff to create a chaos storm, you just habe to heal yourself while below 70% health or take fall damage.

If you want, i can explain the build i created and linked in detail and how it synergizes with the traits later when i get home, i'm on mobile now and it's a hassle to write lol.

@Veprovina.4876 said:Don't ever take Deceptive evasion as a Mirage. You have so many clone generation skills that you'll never not have a clone out. Also, if you don't use phantasms, don't take Dueling either.

I've been toying around with a mirage power/sword build, and I think Deceptive Evasion potentially works better with it than Self-Deception. The sword ambush already makes a clone by default, so this doubles it up, making it very easy to generate clones. Enter a fight with Ambush + Illusionary Leap and you have three fresh clones ready to shatter. And between the Dueling line giving Vigor on crits and mirage giving it on shatters, you have pretty steady access to 50% endurance regen. But I think I'll experiment with Self-Deception tonight so I can take Superiority Complex instead of Deceptive Evasion.

Though, I will readily admit I feel like I'm going a bit against the grain trying to make a mirage power build, but I'm having a lot of fun with it.

@Veprovina.4876 said:Oh, and about the staff, it' ok, but staff is a power weapon, not a condition weapon. I know axe 2 creates a combo field of confusion with chaos storm but chaos storm has a looooònnngg cooldown and staff ambush is really bad, it almost always misses...

Meanwhile, if you pick the chaos trait line, the first tier trait, Descent into madness creates a chaos storm if you take fall damage or heal of you're below treahold so if you use scepter you actually can have a chaos storm in addiion to the amazing scepter ambush and scepter 3 that also creates confusion.

Staff is just "meh" all around, it's slow and clunky and the phantasm it creates scales with power which you don't have as a condition build so idk.. It's usable and staff 2 mobility is great, but other than that it's kinda bad. You get more damage out of scepter than waiting for chaos storm to cooldown so you can combo axe into it.

And as i said, you don't need staff to create a chaos storm, you just habe to heal yourself while below 70% health or take fall damage.

If you want, i can explain the build i created and linked in detail and how it synergizes with the traits later when i get home, i'm on mobile now and it's a hassle to write lol.

Tbh, the staff ambush in PvE is the best condi ambush imo. Not like it's good or something, but it's better than any other condi ambush, at least to me. It would be pretty okay if it could hit targets more reliably. I'd take it over Scepter ambush any day.Staff as a weapon is not the best choice for PvE, I agree (AA and iWarlock need urgent buffs), yet it's still way better in open world than Scepter. In PvE, Scepter is only somewhat decent on long-lasting mobs (champs, bosses).Also, you don't need to be below 70% HP to create Chaos Storm on heal. It will always be summoned as long as you have Descent into Madness traited and it's off cd.

Personally, I find Axe/Torch + Staff to bethe most fun weapon sets for open-world condi shatter build. It has AoE, Cleave, some defense and quite good condi output. You want to sit on Axe/Torch most of the time, but switch to staff when you need to leap out of danger, cast Chaos Storm or use the ambush or when you want some fast shatter fodder.

@Cantatus.4065 said:

@Veprovina.4876 said:Don't ever take Deceptive evasion as a Mirage. You have so many clone generation skills that you'll never not have a clone out. Also, if you don't use phantasms, don't take Dueling either.

In case of the sword, yes, Dueling trait line is ok since it focuses on power. A sword mirage doesn't need chaos or domination trait lines since those focus on condition damage. But if you're using an axe and every skill applies confusion, torment, bleed or some other condition then Dueling is a waste of space when you could have taken something way better. And i'm not talking about pistol phantasms, those scale with power so they benefit from dueling (that's why the meta build uses viper, it has power, precision and condition damage all in one).

But see for example, Chaos trait line. When you're taking Dueling and use Decepticve evasion you get one clone (which mirage can pump out by the dozens anyway). Chaos trait line instead has Bountiful disillusionment which gives a boon depending on which shatter you use. A condition shatter (F2), gives vigor. Why is vigor important? Well, the Mirage trait line nomad's endurance gives you vigor every time you use a shatter skill and vigor gives you condition damage (and that's a baseline trait, so mirage is meant to shatter clones, base mesmer and chronos are for phantasms). So now if you use F2 to apply confusion with shattering your clones, you also gain 2 stacks of vigor because a shatter gives you one, and the F2 specific shatter gives you one which amplifies you condition damage.

This may not seem much, but if you're an axe user, this is damage you're loosing out on if you take dueling and use a shatter build. Dueling and shatters don't mix.For sword it's fine, but even then i'd advise against Deceptive evasion if you're playing mirage because, you can take blinding dissipation to blind foes with shatters, and then take ineptitude which makes your blinds apply confusion. It's not as much confusion as you'd get from other trait lines, but it's better than getting a clone out of a dodge.

@bart.3687 said:

@Veprovina.4876 said:Oh, and about the staff, it' ok, but staff is a power weapon, not a condition weapon. I know axe 2 creates a combo field of confusion with chaos storm but chaos storm has a looooònnngg cooldown and staff ambush is really bad, it almost always misses...

Meanwhile, if you pick the chaos trait line, the first tier trait, Descent into madness creates a chaos storm if you take fall damage or heal of you're below treahold so if you use scepter you actually can have a chaos storm in addiion to the amazing scepter ambush and scepter 3 that also creates confusion.

Staff is just "meh" all around, it's slow and clunky and the phantasm it creates scales with power which you don't have as a condition build so idk.. It's usable and staff 2 mobility is great, but other than that it's kinda bad. You get more damage out of scepter than waiting for chaos storm to cooldown so you can combo axe into it.

And as i said, you don't need staff to create a chaos storm, you just habe to heal yourself while below 70% health or take fall damage.

If you want, i can explain the build i created and linked in detail and how it synergizes with the traits later when i get home, i'm on mobile now and it's a hassle to write lol.

It depends really on what your traits are, but scepter and axe ambush apply the most conditions and most consistently and are therefore the best ambush skills. Staff ambush is a poor mans chaos storm that can miss, so you're neither reliably applying conditions, nor boons to your allies. It's just bad. I mean, if you have fun with it, great, don't let me rain on your parade, but objectively, staff ambush is far from the best PvE ambush skill. If the staff ambush would hit constistently, or bounce around targets like the auto attack does, it would be actually usable but right now it sucks very much in terms of damage and usability. IT's just too random.

And i really wish they did something good with the staff because i freaking love staff as a concept and as a weapon, but everything about it is so bad that i can't use it in any content. It's slow attack speed, slow cooldowns, chaos armor is a wasted skill (useless), ambush skill is slow and unreliable...

I personally hated scepter before, but as a mirage, when you and all of your clones do the scepter ambush, you just can't compare that with the staff ambush. With scepter, at least you know what you're gonna get.

And i didn't know about the HP treshold, i thought you needed to be under 75%. So that's even better. :tongue:

As for what's fun, that's all up to you, hell sometimes i use staff as well, it's fun, but as for what's optimal, staff isn't really that optimal. You'd get way more damage out of a scepter and you can equip another off hand if you want then. So you could use a torch and a pistol or focus. Or just leave the torch.

@Veprovina.4876 said:

@Cantatus.4065 said:

@Veprovina.4876 said:Don't ever take Deceptive evasion as a Mirage. You have so many clone generation skills that you'll never not have a clone out. Also, if you don't use phantasms, don't take Dueling either.

@bart.3687 said:

@Veprovina.4876 said:Oh, and about the staff, it' ok, but staff is a power weapon, not a condition weapon. I know axe 2 creates a combo field of confusion with chaos storm but chaos storm has a looooònnngg cooldown and staff ambush is really bad, it almost always misses...

Meanwhile, if you pick the chaos trait line, the first tier trait, Descent into madness creates a chaos storm if you take fall damage or heal of you're below treahold so if you use scepter you actually can have a chaos storm in addiion to the amazing scepter ambush and scepter 3 that also creates confusion.

Staff is just "meh" all around, it's slow and clunky and the phantasm it creates scales with power which you don't have as a condition build so idk.. It's usable and staff 2 mobility is great, but other than that it's kinda bad. You get more damage out of scepter than waiting for chaos storm to cooldown so you can combo axe into it.

And as i said, you don't need staff to create a chaos storm, you just habe to heal yourself while below 70% health or take fall damage.

If you want, i can explain the build i created and linked in detail and how it synergizes with the traits later when i get home, i'm on mobile now and it's a hassle to write lol.

On staff and scepter's ambushes in open world:Before yesterday's patch, staff ambush applied 2 stacks of torment and 2 stacks of confusion for 5 secs (now it applies 3 stacks of vulnerability for 5 secs, 2 stacks of bleeding for 6 secs and 1 stack of burning for 3 secs but burn hits harder than either confu or toremnt, so the damage output is probably very similar) while scepter applies 5 stacks of either torment or confusion for 4 secs. Staff can miss the target a little more easily (it got improved yesterday: the projectile has been made faster). Scepter is single target while staff can hit multiple targets. Staff can apply boons to you and allies. Staff has better synergy with IH because its clones apply condis for their full duration on ambush, and scepter's clones apply conditions for half the duration. Also, you can stack might and keep perma fury on you if you position your staff clones' ambush correctly. Both ambushes have quite long cast times, but scepter's cast is a little longer than staff's if you don't trait Malicious Sorcery (however you need this trait anyway if you plan on using scepter, otherwise you are crippling yourself even more).To me, it's clear which ambush is stronger, and it's certainly not the scepter's one.Also sorry, but comparing Chaos Vortex to Chaos Storm makes no sense. They are not similar in any way.Side note: Axe ambush got buffs and qol yesterday so yeah, it is quite decent now.

At least we agree on Staff as a whole being kinda underwhelming in pve. :wink: Wouldn't say it's unusable, but it surely should get a lot of changes and improvements, but so do other base mesmer's weapons. Staff, scepter and gs, they all need updates and improvements in pve.

@bart.3687 said:

@Veprovina.4876 said:

@Cantatus.4065 said:

@Veprovina.4876 said:Don't ever take Deceptive evasion as a Mirage. You have so many clone generation skills that you'll never not have a clone out. Also, if you don't use phantasms, don't take Dueling either.

@bart.3687 said:

@Veprovina.4876 said:Oh, and about the staff, it' ok, but staff is a power weapon, not a condition weapon. I know axe 2 creates a combo field of confusion with chaos storm but chaos storm has a looooònnngg cooldown and staff ambush is really bad, it almost always misses...

Meanwhile, if you pick the chaos trait line, the first tier trait, Descent into madness creates a chaos storm if you take fall damage or heal of you're below treahold so if you use scepter you actually can have a chaos storm in addiion to the amazing scepter ambush and scepter 3 that also creates confusion.

Staff is just "meh" all around, it's slow and clunky and the phantasm it creates scales with power which you don't have as a condition build so idk.. It's usable and staff 2 mobility is great, but other than that it's kinda bad. You get more damage out of scepter than waiting for chaos storm to cooldown so you can combo axe into it.

And as i said, you don't need staff to create a chaos storm, you just habe to heal yourself while below 70% health or take fall damage.

If you want, i can explain the build i created and linked in detail and how it synergizes with the traits later when i get home, i'm on mobile now and it's a hassle to write lol.

Well yeah, now it's decent. But That happened yesterday lol, and my post is from before the patch happened. Now it's quite good actually. Still not for me, because i apply confusion and torment with my build and staff's long CD times and it's new ambush won't help me with that, but now it's at least decent.

I'm quite happy staff got some love, even if all they did was improve it's ambush skill. I used to play staff in dungeons way back, i miss the phase retreat mob troll lol. But mirage cloak can troll more if you're just standing in the middle of an aoe and engage the cloak before it hits so i'm fine with that. :tongue:

@Veprovina.4876 said:

@bart.3687 said:

@Veprovina.4876 said:

@Cantatus.4065 said:

@Veprovina.4876 said:Don't ever take Deceptive evasion as a Mirage. You have so many clone generation skills that you'll never not have a clone out. Also, if you don't use phantasms, don't take Dueling either.

@bart.3687 said:

@Veprovina.4876 said:Oh, and about the staff, it' ok, but staff is a power weapon, not a condition weapon. I know axe 2 creates a combo field of confusion with chaos storm but chaos storm has a looooònnngg cooldown and staff ambush is really bad, it almost always misses...

Meanwhile, if you pick the chaos trait line, the first tier trait, Descent into madness creates a chaos storm if you take fall damage or heal of you're below treahold so if you use scepter you actually can have a chaos storm in addiion to the amazing scepter ambush and scepter 3 that also creates confusion.

Staff is just "meh" all around, it's slow and clunky and the phantasm it creates scales with power which you don't have as a condition build so idk.. It's usable and staff 2 mobility is great, but other than that it's kinda bad. You get more damage out of scepter than waiting for chaos storm to cooldown so you can combo axe into it.

And as i said, you don't need staff to create a chaos storm, you just habe to heal yourself while below 70% health or take fall damage.

If you want, i can explain the build i created and linked in detail and how it synergizes with the traits later when i get home, i'm on mobile now and it's a hassle to write lol.

Staff's ambush was decent even before the patch, but it's okay if you think it was not. That's your opinion, and this is my opinion. Quite a nice, little discussion we've had. :tongue:

And yups, it seems we both agree that its not really the ambush that makes staff not a very good option in pve (the ambush actually improves it), but the weapon itself. It's lacking.

Ps: I used to use staff for dungeons back in the days too, had so much fun. It wasn't that bad in pve back then. :grin:

@bart.3687 said:Staff's ambush was decent even before the patch, but it's okay if you think it was not. That's your opinion, and this is my opinion. Quite a nice, little discussion we've had. :tongue:

And yups, it seems we both agree that its not really the ambush that makes staff not a very good option in pve (the ambush actually improves it), but the weapon itself. It's lacking.

Ps: I used to use staff for dungeons back in the days too, had so much fun. It wasn't that bad in pve back then. :grin:

Well i tried it, but i just couldn't get the old ambush to work consistently, and it even had bugs. The only redeeming thing about the staff was chaos storm and the combo field it has with Axe 2. Since that's the build i was going for (confusion shatter). The auto attack is very slow, the cooldowns are abysmal, and i have to take Chaotic dampening to make them "ok", which is not ideal because Chaotic transferrance (toughness to condi damage) works better for my build (dire or trailblazer gear).

All in all, even if i lowered the cooldowns with a trait, a scepter for me is still better even if i don't use the faster scepter attack trait. All i use it for really is scepter 3 skill, and sometimes block, the rest of the clones i generate with jaunt and deception skills until it cools down back to axe.

I always have a staff in my inventory, so i'll definitely try it out next time i log in, see how the new ambush works. And since it burns now, maybe i can use a torch instead of a pistol or something, i'll see about that.

But yeah, i just wish they could make it a good weapon, i love staff, it's just not that "usable". It's fun, but not that usable.