Mesmer: Am I missing something, or....

why are people calling power mirage OP now?

Because it's just like condi Mirage. Constant rotation of kiting, stealthing, evading, stunbreaking, and then they can take out most of your hp with a single burst, forcing you to dodge when you would finally be able to hit them. Other professions have even most extreme damage, but at least you can hit them, and in one particular case (Holo), you can see the burst coming. Holo can be fun to fight. Mirage and mesmer in general is rarely fun to fight.

By the way, can we finally make stealth a good mechanic? Fighting an invisible target isn't fun. There needs to be a way to make stealth more fun to fight against without making it bad.

@"BikeIsGone.8675" said:why are people calling power mirage OP now?

its the combination of high CC, with insane Burst, evades, mobiliy in forms of blinks or leaps (sword ambush), high stealth uptime on demand while not needing to be in melee range, portal play, invulnerability and endless stunbreak.

revs dont have as much CC nor do they have stealth nor can they pressure outside of meele range nor do they have invulns.

thieves have to be in meele range as well unless u play deadeye ( lul ) and shadow trap is just a weak version of portal and nobody plays it. thieves burst is high but not as high as mesmers. a backstab hurts but wont 1 hit in the current year. that was back in 2012. And a thief doesnt have endless stunnbreaks nor invuln,

also s/d thieves dont have reliable stealth

holos dont have endless stunnbreaks either, they have to be in melee range for the main bursts dmg, they have way less mobiliy than mesmer and by far not as many evades as mesmer nor do they have a portal.

mesmer basically combines all the aspects of holo rev and thief a class needs as "dps role" in pvp.

@BikeIsGone.8675 said:why are people calling power mirage OP now?

Because it took a condi Mirage's survability and replaced it's massive condition bursts with massive power bursts.

Given condi mesmer/chrono/mirage aren't flavour of the month anymore, and with more players moving back to power, people have gone a bit slack in dealing with power mesmer burst.

Oh I agree it is one-dimensional, I agree that stealth 100-0 ganks are stupid and unhealthy for the game, and I agree that potentially a few things on mesmer could do with reduction in effectiveness, although having said that give it a bit of time and players will recall how to negate shatters.

Elusive mind.

@shadowpass.4236 said:

@BikeIsGone.8675 said:why are people calling power mirage OP now?

To be fair condi mirage (well condi mes in general) had way more survivability with carrion amulet and the kite potential from staff.

Plus unlike condi mirage the burst at least has wind-up, downtime, and is pretty easy to dodge/mitigate.

Really anet just needs to finally rework elusive mind already and power will be fine.

@tartarus.1082 said:

@shadowpass.4236 said:

@BikeIsGone.8675 said:why are people calling power mirage OP now?

Fair enough.

Though when the burst does land, 85% or more of your health is gone.

@shadowpass.4236 said:

@tartarus.1082 said:

@shadowpass.4236 said:

@BikeIsGone.8675 said:why are people calling power mirage OP now?

Yeah in all honesty I never liked the stealth gank playstyle. Ideally I’d like to see Power Mesmer in general be a slower dps and spec for it’s utility such as strip, group cleanse, etc.

Plus an instant cast stun is pretty cheesy, I never liked the idea of the trait

All of those bursts require a multi step setup. There is absolutely no "100-0." Players who are not themselves Mesmers may not see the setup, but they should note the buildup of confusion and/or vulnerability. Mesmers withdraw when they are in trouble. Others should do likewise.

We are finally moving toward the "high risk-High Reward" that we're supposed to be. For a very long time it's been "high Risk-Mediocre Reward."

I got one-shot by a Chronomancer yesterday as a Scrapper. Although I didn’t have any extra toughness, that damage.. hits hard. It didn’t feel very good unfortunately. :pensive:

Phantasmal Disenchanter hit for 9KMind Wrack hit for 5KPhantasmal Berserker(s) hit for 7KHoly ducks it wasn’t a nice moment.

Note : I had Bulwark Gyro’s defense buff on me when this happened by the way. Their Mesmer had the most kills&damage. Duck.

LOL, somebody said Mesmer is a high risk class. :-D

@"Ithilwen.1529" said:All of those bursts require a multi step setup. There is absolutely no "100-0." Players who are not themselves Mesmers may not see the setup, but they should note the buildup of confusion and/or vulnerability. Mesmers withdraw when they are in trouble. Others should do likewise.

We are finally moving toward the "high risk-High Reward" that we're supposed to be. For a very long time it's been "high Risk-Mediocre Reward."

It might be multi hit but is still extremely short duration high damage dump which effectively 100-0 or at least 100-10 many targets.

As much as I have thoroughly enjoyed and played power shatter in the past, I grew tired of the one-dimensional playstyle a long time ago. It is a little boring (people say condi is boring but tbh I find power shatter almost more boring unless played by very good and unpredictable players). I'd rather see power mesmer be shifted slightly more towards bruiser with high damage rather than pseudo glass (not really given the defences of mirage...) cannon with insane damage.

@Curunen.8729 said:

@"Ithilwen.1529" said:All of those bursts require a multi step setup. There is absolutely no "100-0." Players who are not themselves Mesmers may not see the setup, but they should note the buildup of confusion and/or vulnerability. Mesmers withdraw when they are in trouble. Others should do likewise.

We are finally moving toward the "high risk-High Reward" that we're supposed to be. For a very long time it's been "high Risk-Mediocre Reward."

I completely agree and hope the Phantasm changes and rework eventually lead us to that form of playstyle. I’ve also never liked the general linearity of the skills and how the spec plays

@tartarus.1082 said:

@Curunen.8729 said:

@"Ithilwen.1529" said:All of those bursts require a multi step setup. There is absolutely no "100-0." Players who are not themselves Mesmers may not see the setup, but they should note the buildup of confusion and/or vulnerability. Mesmers withdraw when they are in trouble. Others should do likewise.

We are finally moving toward the "high risk-High Reward" that we're supposed to be. For a very long time it's been "high Risk-Mediocre Reward."

That was the intent of the original Chronomancer. It was cut off at the knees, mid season after the outcry. I'd also note the Mirage is a bruiser spec. In fact, it could be argued that anet is pushing for that to be the only Mesmer playstyle.

@Ithilwen.1529 said:

@tartarus.1082 said:

@Curunen.8729 said:

@Ithilwen.1529 said:All of those bursts require a multi step setup. There is absolutely no "100-0." Players who are not themselves Mesmers may not see the setup, but they should note the buildup of confusion and/or vulnerability. Mesmers withdraw when they are in trouble. Others should do likewise.

We are finally moving toward the "high risk-High Reward" that we're supposed to be. For a very long time it's been "high Risk-Mediocre Reward."

In general mirage has been extremely bursty and was intended to be thief ported onto Mesmer rather than a bruiser. I do agree though that Mesmer is soon going to become a bruiser like playstyle, which imo is more interesting than the other builds we’ve had as meta.

Any mirage build instantly has bruiser-level of survivability thanks to the insane invuln uptime.

Burst mirage is high reward...near 0 risk...Sounds about par for the course with Anet balance team. Maybe they'll change it early 2019 with their snails pace of balance.

Bruiser would imply mesmers can take a hit.

And if I remember correctly, mesmers blow up as soon as you touch them the wrong way. They are basically eles, but with WAY better traits.

Few days after the update and people are already complaining about another mesmer build. Condi mirage was definitely overpowered, but I see no logic in complainst about power.

I'm definitely sure that most people who complain here never actually tried power mirage in a proper pvp match.

So let's see:I'm assuming we are talking about spvp here, as WvW sadly can't be considered for balance purposes. I'm also assuming Marauder amulet, as Berserker is totally useless in most scenarios (you can surprise people first, then you will be dying 24/7)

Currently, you can play power mirage with Dueling / Domi / Mirage setup. This one is the old-school build, mediocre in high level pvp. Rarely seen in top250 in last season. Decent burst and survivability (you have a very nice vigor uptime etc.), but basically you have one stealth (torch4). Burst is predictable, recharge of the burst is around 12-15 sec, depends on that situation. If you run the IH variant, you have a pretty good chance quite a few 1v1 setups and better burst, but you lose Elusive Mind (IH in general, is better). Condi clear is pretty sh*tty. You have blind on shatter which is extremely usefulThis build was very slightly buffed by Phantasmal Berserker change and the autoattacks, but it's close to nothing.

Now there is a new build (even on metabattle, I guess most people are using that) using Illusions instead of Dueling.What you lose: you lose Deceptive Evasion, which cuts your illusion generations really bad. You lose your high vigor uptime, meaning you are a lot more vulnerable as you have less mirage cloaks. Let's say you are running Mental Anguish, becaues you need it for more damage, which means you lose Power Block, basically the best trait you can have on mesmer in top tier pvp. You really need Elusive Mind for this build, so IH is a no-go (less interrupts and daze spam, less GS 1 dmg). You lose the Blind on shatter trait.What you get instead: a lot more frequent bursts, fast execution (via quickness), kinda feels like more of a sustain build, double Mind Wrack (useless until you have at least 2 clones so not that good as it looks like). Compounding brings your damage a bit higher if you are playing it properly.

The counters:First build is harder to kill, if the full spike hits you(it shouldn't), which is like 4 skills you can say you lose 40-60% of your hp depending on the profession etc. Doesn't hit you too frequent, and it's predictable (SHATTERS people, the clones run to you, and there is a big a*ss purple sword flying towards you)Stealth burst easily predicted, count the stealth seconds then use defense / dodge.

Second build is squishier, a well-timed burst between the evade frames erases them literally. The evade frames are less frequent than the first build. Hit them, they will evade, probably blurred frenzy, evade again (this is the worst case scenario, assuming they came with full endurance). Sometimes distortion comes in, but this chain highly negates their damage dealing potential. Also, distortion is on high cd. Time a burst (condi, power, whatever) between their frames, they will be dead in no time. (SHATTERS people, the clones run to you, and there is a big a*ss purple sword flying towards you)Stealth burst easily predicted, count the stealth seconds then use defense / dodge.

FYI: Both have one stealth skill (torch4), if they have two, they are bad, and losing out on one of the lot more beneficial utilities.

Happy to hear more insights from the mesmer professionals in this thread or wherever.

tl;dr: There are a lot of learn-to-play issues against mesmer and the concept of 'i don't wanna know what's actually happening just nerf xy class'

@Ithilwen.1529 said:

@tartarus.1082 said:

@Curunen.8729 said:

@Ithilwen.1529 said:All of those bursts require a multi step setup. There is absolutely no "100-0." Players who are not themselves Mesmers may not see the setup, but they should note the buildup of confusion and/or vulnerability. Mesmers withdraw when they are in trouble. Others should do likewise.

We are finally moving toward the "high risk-High Reward" that we're supposed to be. For a very long time it's been "high Risk-Mediocre Reward."

Oh yes, Mirage has bruiser sustain, but it still has glass cannon burst - that is a problem. Personally I'd rather they keep the sustain on Mirage but adjust the burst output.

People saying we are still complaining about mesmer, the problem is since the beginning of the game mesmer always was the god pvp class and this cannot be denied.

They never managed to balance it properly and always was the class of spamming shatters = profit.

Now maybe it is not easy to understand at the beginning, but let's be serious, the power mirage build now even a blinded monkey can play it, it's like pve rotations applied on pvp, and the problem is the insane burst can be done at range tho.

Even spellbreaker is harder to play compared to power mirage, being a melee only class without instant teleport but only low slow range gap closers.

The only way to counter mirage is being an aoe dps, if you are a single target dps you will have a tough time against all those stupid clones.

Since the first pvp season began never saw a mesmer out of the meta, or am I wrong?

@whoknocks.4935 said:The only way to counter mirage is being an aoe dps, if you are a single target dps you will have a tough time against all those stupid clones.

Oh you mean AoE dps like every single class? The horror of mesmer being hard on like... longbow/longbow ranger? I guess.

I also find the idea that spellbreaker being harder to play than a mirage hilarious.

@Dawdler.8521 said:

@whoknocks.4935 said:The only way to counter mirage is being an aoe dps, if you are a single target dps you will have a tough time against all those stupid clones.

You can't say power mirage ia hard to play come on, stay at range with gs and use all the rotation plus shatter, ah and that can be done pre stealthing.

Very hard to pull off yeah.

If you fail? Just disengage with you 100 evades stunbreaks, stealth options, return to the fight and repeat. This is power mirage. Definetely easier than spellbreaker yeah. Spellbreaker is even easier to counter, all the attacks are so obvious, the stuns, the full counter.

@whoknocks.4935 said:

You can't say power mirage ia hard to play come on, stay at range with gs and use all the rotation plus shatter, ah and that can be done pre stealthing.

Very hard to pull off yeah.

If you fail? Just disengage with you 100 evades stunbreaks, stealth options, return to the fight and repeat. This is power mirage. Definetely easier than spellbreaker yeah. Spellbreaker is even easier to counter, all the attacks are so obvious, the stuns, the full counter.You have never played Power mirage.

And I kinda feel like you have never played against a good Spellbreaker either.

mesmer op buff teef pls ok good