Patch notes!

Mesmer

Mesmer phantasms were heavily reworked in this update. For more information on our goals and reasons for these changes, please see our post on the official forums called "Shattering the Status Quo."In addition to the phantasm changes, there were also changes to confusion duration and stack counts, which are part of a larger effort to cut down on confusion uptime in competitive modes. Finally, as part of our update to alacrity as a boon (also covered in its own forum post called "Alacrity: Time for a Change"), we reworked some underperforming chronomancer traits.

General

Shatter Skills: These skills now only shatter clones. Descriptions have been updated to reflect their new functionality.Phantasms: Phantasms can no longer be shattered and no longer count toward your maximum illusion count. Phantasms are destroyed and then replaced by clones after completing their unique attack or if their attack is interrupted.Downed Clones: Fixed a bug in which downed clones could persist after a rally. Fixed a bug in which downed clones could exceed the illusion limit.

Traits

All's Well That Ends Well: This trait no longer causes wells to grant alacrity when they end. Instead, it causes wells to heal allies within the well's radius on the last pulse.Improved Alacrity: This trait now causes alacrity applied to you to improve skill-recharge speed by 50%, but it reduces the duration of incoming alacrity from all sources by 33%. Alacrity applied to others is unaffected.Danger Time: This trait now also increases critical-hit damage by 10% against slowed foes.Lost Time: This trait now deals a second strike of bonus damage when slow is applied. Increased slow's duration from 2 seconds to 3 seconds.Seize the Moment: Increased the duration of quickness per each summoned illusion from 1 second to 1.5 seconds. Updated the description to specify that it counts clones rather than all illusion types.Chronophantasma: This trait now causes phantasms to resummon themselves after the first time they would normally be replaced with a clone. A phantasm that resummons itself will not create a clone.Imagined Burden: This trait no longer grants might. It now causes the Phantasmal Berserker skill to spawn an extra berserker phantasm, but it reduces berserker phantasm damage by 25%.Ineptitude: This trait has been split, and now confusion has been reduced from 5 seconds to 3 seconds in PvP and WvW only.Riddle of Sand: This trait has been split, and now confusion duration has been reduced from 4 seconds to 2 seconds in PvP and WvW only.Healing Prism: This trait no longer grants healing power for each illusion you control. Instead, it converts 13% of your power into healing power.Persistence of Memory: Boons are now transferred when phantasms become clones.Phantasmal Haste: This trait and now causes summoned phantasms to spawn with 3 seconds of quickness. The mesmer also gains 1.5 seconds of quickness whenever a phantasm is summoned.Illusionary Inspiration: This trait no longer causes phantasms to grant regeneration. Instead, summoning a phantasm grants 2 stacks of might for 10 seconds to the caster and four nearby allies. This effect occurs after the activation of Lesser Signet of Inspiration.Protected Phantasms: This trait now causes summoned phantasms to spawn with 5 seconds of aegis.Persisting Images: This trait has been renamed Sympathetic Visage and causes newly summoned phantasms to draw 1 condition from the caster to themselves.Illusionary Defense: This trait now grants a stacking 5% damage-reduction enhancement (maximum of 5 stacks) for 5 seconds whenever you summon an illusion.Phantasmal Force: This trait now grants phantasms 1% increased damage for each stack of might you have when they are first summoned. Phantasms that become clones grant 3 stacks of might for 10 seconds to the mesmer.Master of Misdirection: This trait no longer increases confusion duration.Illusionist's Celerity: This trait has been replaced with Compounding Power.Shattered Strength: This trait has been replaced with Escape Artist, which causes you to create a clone when you enter stealth.Compounding Power: This trait has moved to the minor trait slot of the master tier, and it now grants a stacking 3% flat-damage boost and 30 condition damage (with a maximum of 5 stacks) for 8 seconds whenever an illusion is created.Shatter Storm: This trait takes the place of Compounding Power in the major adept tier and causes Mind Wrack to become a skill with 2 ammo.Illusionary Retribution: This trait has been reworked and renamed Cry of Pain. It causes Cry of Frustration to inflict 2 additional stacks of confusion per illusion shattered, and it extends the duration of confusion applied by Cry of Frustration by 33%.Illusionary Reversion: Updated the description to specify that it counts clones rather than all illusion types.Delayed Reactions: This trait now also gives you alacrity for 2 seconds when you interrupt a foe. Fixed a bug that prevented this trait from working on enemies with defiance bars.Time Catches Up: Increased shatter damage against movement-impaired foes by 10% in PvE, and by 5% in PvP and WvW.Restorative Illusions: Updated the description to specify that it counts clones rather than all illusion types.

Weapon Skills

When using weapon skill 1 with a sword, increased the damage of the mesmer's first two attacks by 7%. Increased the damage of the final sword attack by 11% against foes with boons and by 51% against foes with no boons.Illusionary Leap: Reduced the aftercast by 0.15 seconds.Spatial Surge: Increased damage at each range threshold, starting from the closest, by 28%, 18%, 11%, and 6%.Mirror Blade: Increased damage by 43% in PvE only.Ether Barrage: Torment and confusion durations have been reduced from 4 seconds to 2 seconds in PvP and WvW only.Confusing Images: Confusion duration has been reduced from 7 seconds to 4 seconds in WvW and PvP only.Magic Bullet: This skill now inflicts confusion on each impact. Confusion has been increased from 1 stack to 3 stacks with a duration of 5 seconds in PvE and 3 seconds in PvP and WvW.Axes of Symmetry: The confusion aspect of this skill has been split. Confusion stacks have been reduced in WvW and PvP from 5 to 3, and their duration has been reduced from 4 seconds to 3 seconds. Clone-inflicted confusion duration has been reduced from 4 seconds to 3 seconds.Imaginary Axes: The confusion aspect of this skill has been split, and the confusion duration has been reduced from 5 seconds to 3 seconds in PvP and WvW only.Mind Blast: The confusion aspect of this skill has been split, and confusion has been reduced from 1 stack for 5 seconds to 2 stacks for 3 seconds in PvP and WvW only.Winds of Chaos: Instead of inflicting vulnerability, this attack now has a chance to inflict 1 stack of torment for 5 seconds.Tides of Time: This skill no longer applies quickness. Instead, it applies 2 seconds of alacrity to allies when the skill's wave animation passes through them. This skill now uses ground targeting.

Utility Skills

Ether Feast: This skill now only grants bonus healing for clones.Signet of the Ether: The passive effect no longer heals on interval or scales with the number of illusions. Instead, it now heals for a flat amount whenever an illusion is summoned.Signet of Illusions: The passive effect has been changed; it now causes a clone to be automatically summoned every 10 seconds while you are in combat.Signet of Inspiration: This skill's active effect will now share 2 seconds of alacrity if the caster has alacrity in addition to its previous effects. The passive effect has been updated to randomly apply 2 seconds of alacrity in addition to its previous boons.Jaunt: Condition duration from this skill has been split. In PvE, the confusion duration has been increased from 4 seconds to 6 seconds. In PvP and WvW, the confusion duration has been reduced from 4 seconds to 2 seconds.

Phantasm Skills

Phantasmal Berserker: Increased the damage of the thrown greatsword by 100%. Reduced the recharge from 20 seconds to 15 seconds in PvE.Phantasmal Rogue: Reduced the recharge from 20 seconds to 8 seconds. If the rogue hits with an attack, the recharge of this skill is reduced by 25%. This skill no longer has an attack separate from the phantasm summon. Significantly reduced the skill's aftercast. Updated the underwater casting time to better match the casting time on land. Fixed a bug that prevented this skill from dealing its bonus damage. Bonus damage has been reduced to 50% in PvE and 25% in PvP and WvW.Phantasmal Duelist: The attack from the mesmer now fires three bullets that quickly travel to the target after a short delay. Each bullet deals 230% more damage than the previous version of this attack.Phantasmal Swordsman: This phantasm now performs a flurry of attacks after the leap attack. The damage of the leap attack has been decreased by 30%, but the overall damage has increased. The initial attack from this skill no longer grants might to phantasms.Phantasmal Mage: The mage summoned by this skill now creates a cone-shaped wave of fire that interrupts foes and applies burning and confusion. The mage now spawns near your target instead of near you.Phantasmal Disenchanter: The phantasm summoned by this skill now fires a bouncing projectile that only bounces to enemies. This attack is unblockable and removes 5 boons from the targets it strikes. The base attack damage has been increased by 300%. This attack deals 250% more damage against foes without boons. The initial boon removal from the mesmer has been eliminated.Phantasmal Warlock: This skill now summons two warlocks that channel a beam on your target, inflicting 2 stacks of vulnerability for 5 seconds. Each beam hits 3 times.Phantasmal Defender: This skill taunts your target and all nearby foes for 3 seconds in PvE and for 1 second in PvP and WvW, then blocks attacks. After it has finished blocking, it explodes, dealing damage based on how many attacks it blocked. The phantasm now spawns closer to the caster's location. It no longer grants protection. The recharge has been increased to 40 seconds in PvE and 50 seconds in PvP and WvW.Lesser Phantasmal Defender: The recharge of this skill has changed to the same values as Phantasmal Defender.Echo of Memory: The phantasm summoned by this skill no longer applies alacrity when it attacks. Its attack damage has been increased by 160%.Phantasmal Warden: This phantasm now initially spawns near the caster. Significantly increased the phantasm's movement speed. Removed the initial axe throw from the mesmer. This phantasm now throws axes at random targets within a range of 600 of itself, but it no longer damages nearby targets. Damage per hit has been increased by 22%. Reduced the recharge from 25 seconds to 20 seconds. Lowered the casting time from 1 second to 0.5 seconds.Illusionary Whaler: This skill has been renamed to Phantasmal Whaler for consistency with other phantasm skills. Confusion duration has been increased from 3 seconds to 6 seconds. Increased the confusion stacks per hit from 1 to 2. Reduced the recharge from 20 seconds to 5 seconds. This skill now uses the ammunition system and has 2 casts with a 15-second recharge between casts. Damage has been increased by 30%.Illusionary Mariner: This skill has been renamed to Phantasmal Mariner for consistency with other phantasm skills. Lowered the recharge from 20 seconds to 10 seconds. Increased the strike damage by 8%, and increased the final strike damage by 74%.

Echo of Memory: The phantasm summoned by this skill no longer applies alacrity when it attacks. Its attack damage has been increased by 160%.

• • .

and they did not nerf anything about rev alacrity .

new idefender is interesting tho

Take a two month break from GW2 come back Condition mesmer damage cut in half due to massive duration changes to confusion.Man i can't believe the forums won, this is insane.Thanks for the power buffs in PvE.

But no thanks power mirage is now meta condition mirage just died today (sPvP)

Im kinda new back in the game...are this nerf or what? can someone give a short version? im still not familiar with everything to know about mesmer in details.

@kventura.8356 said:Im kinda new back in the game...are this nerf or what? can someone give a short version? im still not familiar with everything to know about mesmer in detHails.

HUGE Condition nerfs in PvP.Big buffs to power damage 1h sword gs.Big changes to phantasms to early to tell if buff or nerf.

Shatter 1 change explores some interesting things i'm testing it as we speak.

RIP illusionists celerity :( you will be missed

Wells no longer grant alacrity, instead they heal at the end.... I see the crys coming....

Improved Alacrity Trait: Recharge up to 50% but alacrity duration time 33% reduced (when you equip the trait) .....ehh yeah, reduce the time,but we will see how this turns out...

Chronophantasm: Spawns a second phantasm when the first one shatters itself, the second phantasm will not be a clone after this....rlly?

Illusionary Inspiration: 2 Stacks Might to you and 4 others instead of Regeneration to all nearby of an phantasm.....R.I.P. Regeneration on Mesmer, why not make it a: Regeneration to all nearby of your clones trait?.....

Winds of Chaos, should i laught, instead of random vulnerability one random stack torment? No DmG up for staff auto....no attack speed up, no projectile speed up...nothing what the community wished....i think i saw a poll where 49% of the forum users wished for a change for the staff....

My personal cry moment was the time when i read the change on Illusionary inspiration, for close range mesmers phantasms that grant nearby allies regeneration were good....what should i do wit 2 stacks of might, might i can get elsewhere....but where to get regeneration?....

Well enough patch notes reading, i will test it and see if i can make something out of it.....or if i will change class......after reading this notes i likely will change class...

Some early impressions before I can jump in.

Seems Chrono is getting stuff to make it a Power DPS line as well as a support line.Clone Mirage dps got a buff from a multiple of changes. Might take illusions instead of Chaos.Is that a Staff auto attack buff?Weapons didn't get the damage increase I was hoping for but Phantasms and the Mesmer attacks on the skill got much bigger buffs then I was expecting. In fact I expected them to remove the bonus Mesmer attack.Not sure this will create a shatter style dps build but a lot of interesting stuff to play around with on shatters and Illusion generation now.Ammo system on Mind Wrack!?!

@musu.9205 said:Echo of Memory: The phantasm summoned by this skill no longer applies alacrity when it attacks. Its attack damage has been increased by 160%.

• • .

and they did not nerf anything about rev alacrity .

new idefender is interesting tho

Serene Rejuvenation on Revs had its alacrity lowered from 3s to 2s. That's a 33% decrease in alacrity generation from that trait.

@Genesis.5169 They did say that the confusion condition was receiving adjustments. It sounds like it will now be dealing significantly more damage on skill use, so this could be a huge buff against players that use skills when they have confusion. Which turns confusion into a pretty powerful skill denial tool, even though its duration was cut. And that's what it should have been all along anyway

About the rest of the changes, most of them look amazing. iDefender sounds awful to me honestly, and some others sound questionable, but I need to play this before I can say for sure

@OriOri.8724 said:

@musu.9205 said:Echo of Memory: The phantasm summoned by this skill no longer applies alacrity when it attacks. Its attack damage has been increased by 160%.

• • .

and they did not nerf anything about rev alacrity .

new idefender is interesting tho

Duration for nearly all condtion skills have been cut in half, unless you catch some one whose about to perform an action your likely not gonna get that great new damage. Its like Anet decide well no one is going to cleanse it so lets just have it drop really fast.

Shatter Storm: This trait takes the place of Compounding Power in the major adept tier and causes Mind Wrack to become a skill with 2 ammo.

great for pvp power shatter

The Phantasm damages changes are SO BURSTY! I like it

Another nerf (although not that big) for scepter, as if the weapon was overperforming. Really?Other than that, the patchnotes seem interesting, some of them look lovely (MW with ammo aw yiss), others not so much (Illusionist's Celerity gone :c). Gotta play and check it out.

Oh my god that all looks AMAZING! :astonished:

Oh my god shatter storm F1 with ammunition?!? Damn that's scary if used with power Mesmer.

Love the new iWarden, iMage and even iWarlock with its double phantasm.

The confusion stack nerfs on axe and jaunt are fine, I have no problem with this (one of the perks of hybrid - always land on your feet no matter what is nerfed, power or condi).

Ah too much for me to comment on right now - but overall, from a personal perspective I'm ecstatic with the changes. :D

@bart.3687 said:Another nerf (although not that big) for scepter, as if the weapon was overperforming. Really?Other than that, the patchnotes look interesting, some of them look lovely (MW with ammo aw yiss), others not so much (Illusionist's Celerity gone :c). Gotta play and check it out.

Yep i saw that too and its not, it's just the folks in PvP refuse to accept any viable condition builds whatsoever. Community decided that they would rather be 1 shot by a power mesmer with no time for counterplay then fight a condition mesmer.

@Genesis.5169 said:

@bart.3687 said:Another nerf (although not that big) for scepter, as if the weapon was overperforming. Really?Other than that, the patchnotes look interesting, some of them look lovely (MW with ammo aw yiss), others not so much (Illusionist's Celerity gone :c). Gotta play and check it out.

That’s because they would. For the most part they have an issue about bringing cleanse and would much rather see big numbers appear on the screen. Unless it’s a 15 clone mind wrack from stealth. They don’t like that.

I know it's probably not going to be as awesome as I imagine, but... Imagined Burden (2x berserker phantasms, reduced GS recharge?) paired with Illusions (reduced illusion recharge rate) paired with Chronophantasma (phantasms respawn instead of turning to clones) is making me SO EXCITED... I'm just picturing a barrage of 4 illusionary bersekers swinging through an area.

Overall though... I'm super excited to see how this plays out. I'm sure there will be some awful aspects of these changes, and some great ones. Overall, I'm really interested in seeing shatters be a more reliable, normal part of our rotation. Also excited for Chronomancers to have more to do than simply be alacrity tanks. Also hopefully these changes might improve Mesmer's AoE contributions in WvW a little bit where the phantasms survival is less of a requirement for success.

I'm a little worried about our regen losses and some of the numbers needing more tweaks (confusion in PvE, wild large swings on weapon multipliers)

@Kelthien.8593 Illusionists celerity was removed. The illusions line now doesn't have CD reduction on illusion skills, period. That has been removed from the game entirely.

@OriOri.8724 said:@Kelthien.8593 Illusionists celerity was removed. The illusions line now doesn't have CD reduction on illusion skills, period. That has been removed from the game entirely.

Aww sad! well still excited about the GS zerkers all the same. lol. I thought their natural cooldown was lowered for some phantasms. I'm just digging the idea of a small, temporary army.

I'd like to see some tests on alacrity upkeep in PvE. With the removal of alacrity on both wells and the shield phantasm, it sounds like chrono might be required to run well of recall to maintain reasonable alacrity. That would drastically limit the utility options for raids.

Signet of Illusions passive looks really cool.

Also the trait siphoning a condition onto a new phantasm - that's excellent and something I've been hoping to see.

Phantasmal Haste looks strong for lining up burst.

But damn, I can't get over Shatter Storm... that trait is... unhealthy.

@OriOri.8724 said:@Kelthien.8593 Illusionists celerity was removed. The illusions line now doesn't have CD reduction on illusion skills, period. That has been removed from the game entirely.

Which sucks considering they didn’t adjust the cd’s on any of the phantasms to compensate for the one attack.(granted it does look like the increased the damage for most of them, pistol looks interesting)

Here we goMLG POWER SHATTER MESMER ONE SHOT IN 1 SECOND!!!!! ARENANET BANNED ME FOR HACKING (LUL) AFTER THIS ONE!!!!!

I love these changes. Condition Mirage was broken OP anyway. I hated it tbh. Here we go with the Power Chronos again folks. I love this. I f-ing love this.

@OriOri.8724 said:

@musu.9205 said:Echo of Memory: The phantasm summoned by this skill no longer applies alacrity when it attacks. Its attack damage has been increased by 160%.

• • .

and they did not nerf anything about rev alacrity .

new idefender is interesting tho

oh i missed that .

but tbh im already using harrier rev its overall a huge buff to rev .

i heard everyone only got 20k around condi mirage . but i didnt see any big dps nerf , it could be bug ?

They are trying to balance shatter spam by removing it. Can't say I am happy about that atm, because I really enjoyed it. I would like to see it come back, even if adjustments have to be made (probably iWarlock, imagined burden no longer making izerker spawn a second one and some other ones), but I understand why it was removed. Though its overall a pretty large nerf to a lot of skills. Notably phase retreat and mirror images, no mention of a CD reduction on it, which I have to believe is an oversight?