Help with fighting a mesmer

Hello everyone,

I mostly play in WvW and often find myself fighting mesmers, well mostly mirages, when I am roaming around. I have a really hard time fighting them as I can never tell which one is a clone and which one is the actual player. Some people in chat have told me to look for the one with all the buffs ... but they all have buffs. Now I understand that this is probably the whole point of having the clones but is there a more effective way of identifying which one to shoot/stab than just cycling through constantly moving targets?In case it helps, I play core Ranger and use Longbow with sword and dagger.

Any tips welcome!

The look for buffs trick works quite well to start with. The clones will have buffs as well however you are looking for specific buffs that clones do not have. Look for food/utillity buffs, signets and more uncommon clone boons like stabillity, vigor, etc.

You will have to keep fighting mesmers and/or play one yourself to learn their animations, when you know the animations clones do not use you can identify the real mesmer this way.

Another thing that comes with time is understanding how an AI clone moves, the real mesmer can then be singled out cause it moves like a clone would not.

Core ranger vs mesmer feels like a bad matchup for the ranger, if you have PoF consider using soulbeast, it is in a really good spot right now.

@GaijinGuy.8476 said:Hello everyone,

I mostly play in WvW and often find myself fighting mesmers, well mostly mirages, when I am roaming around. I have a really hard time fighting them as I can never tell which one is a clone and which one is the actual player. Some people in chat have told me to look for the one with all the buffs ... but they all have buffs. Now I understand that this is probably the whole point of having the clones but is there a more effective way of identifying which one to shoot/stab than just cycling through constantly moving targets?In case it helps, I play core Ranger and use Longbow with sword and dagger.

Any tips welcome!

Aside from boons, look at the health bars. Remember that clones spawn with full health while the mesmer will often be at less than full health. Additionally, pay attention to movement. Ranged clones that are within range to attack will stand in place and spam their attacks while melee clones will tend to run in a straight line toward you. The real mesmer will usually be the one with less than full health that is doing something other than this. Finally, familiarize yourself with mesmer teleports and target breaks so you know what to expect.

Beyond that it's like any other class. Familiarize yourself with the moves they make and try to anticipate what they're going to do based upon their actions. But honestly, even if you know what's coming this is just a bear of a class to fight 1v1 with most builds. They have tons of escapes, misdirection, evasion, reflects and can sustain heavy pressure against aggressive opponents. They can take down glass cannon builds in a quick burst covered by invuln/evasion or wear down most builds in prolonged engagements. It's a difficult combination to handle with most builds.

Welcome to fighting the most broken class in wvw/pvp. In short, you can never beat a good mirage. You cant outplay them unless they are really bad, or they dont know you are there. Things you need to watch out for are: evade through stuns, invulnerability, reflect spam, daze spam, blind spam, clone spam (there can be much more than 3 out at a time), multiple target breaks/stealth, excellent mobility, 1 shot combos or confusion/torment burst.

The only reasonable way to kill mirage in wvw is to burst them from 100-0 in between all their evades/invulns. If you try to out-sustain they will just run away and reset, and you arent going to catch them unless you are a thief, gs/bird soulbeast, or another mirage. The problem with bursting them is they break target and cc you so much that you have little to no chance of getting a burst combo off unless they are focused on attacking someone else.

The only reasonable way to counter target breaks is to be able to spot the mes, and then click on them in the mess of clones they have. Clones only auto attack, they do not have food/xp buffs or signets etc, and they do not move side to side or backwards. Once you have the mes targeted, you have to time your attacks so they dont just evade through everything, but if you take more than a few seconds to set up, they will target break and spam you with clones, blind and daze again.

Most matchups vs mirage are in favor of the mirage. When facing power, there are more builds that counter it, but the mirage will usually be able to run away and reset if they are losing. The only meta builds I have seen work consistently vs condi mirage are ones with extremely good sustain, like protection holo, boonbeast, or the tanky sw/d weaver build. Mirage is usually weak to condi, but good mirages will just kite most condi builds. 1shot gimmick builds can work but usually dont vs condi because of defensive gear like trailblazers.

Since you play ranger, i would either try some soulbeast longbow build or boonbeast. If you dont have PoF, core ranger stealth condi trapper might work too but ive never really seen one fight a mirage.

The most broken class on wvw isn't wanted on zergs and on pvp other professions fill the role better. So much brokeness.

There was this guy on pvp who did fine with core ranger, even against the might op broken mirages.Regarding the targeting, call target, easier to follow the real mesmer, you'll have to retarget some times tho.Build something with WS/NM and survival skills, might want to try condi ranger s/t and a/d since mirages don't spec into condi cleanse and the 3 skills used for condi cleanse are also used offensively, and you'll have plenty of evades.

@Lincolnbeard.1735 said:The most broken class on wvw isn't wanted on zergs and on pvp other professions fill the role better. So much brokeness.

There was this guy on pvp who did fine with core ranger, even against the might op broken mirages.Regarding the targeting, call target, easier to follow the real mesmer, you'll have to retarget some times tho.Build something with WS/NM and survival skills, might want to try condi ranger s/t and a/d since mirages don't spec into condi cleanse and the 3 skills used for condi cleanse are also used offensively, and you'll have plenty of evades.

It's definitely an odd combination. Condi mirage is weak to conditions, but they have so much control with reflect, evade, etc. and high mobility it can be difficult to sustain any kind of pressure against them.

Certain builds can definitely force a stalemate and/or escape, but actually beating a condi mirage of equal skill 1v1 in WvW roaming? I'm not sure I know of any builds that I'd give the edge to in that scenario. There might be a thief setup or two that could pull off a win more often than they lose? And I know some necro builds can sometimes pull a win with boon corrupt and condi transfer (I'd still give the clear advantage to condi mirage). But I'd say condi mirage in the WvW environment is the undisputed king of duelists.

PvP is another matter. It's still exceptionally strong and at an advantage against most builds 1v1, but 1) You don't have unlimited time in PvP, 2) You have to hold points to actually win, and 3) The stats don't favor mirage as much as they do in WvW. Since mirage is not as strong in team fights and can't dominate matches without taking down enemies quickly in 1v1, it's not as problematic in that scenario.

Also, as you note, condi mirage is absolute garbage in WvW zerg. It's a dominant roaming spec. That's all it's good for. Which presents a problem balancing it. Is it unfair in that scenario? Absolutely! But without redesigning the class, how do you make it more useful in the areas it currently has weaknesses while simultaneously addressing the areas where it's overpowered? That's a tough call.

^ With WS and survival you clean 2 condis with each survival skill, you can throw in empathic bond and the signet if needed.Never tried dueling with core ranger, but with sb not even boonbeast they're not that hard, most players in wvw suck, so there's that.Roaming I can think of at least 2 professions that do even better.

As for pvp, I don't even remember the name of the dude/dudette I mentioned, he/she was female asura, it was when pof was released, but almost sure s/he ran the core meta build at the time.Oh there was also Ashkew who sometimes ran core.

But for an easier time I think condi ranger might be a safe bet.

@"AliamRationem.5172" said:Certain builds can definitely force a stalemate and/or escape, but actually beating a condi mirage of equal skill 1v1 in WvW roaming? I'm not sure I know of any builds that I'd give the edge to in that scenario.A sustain mirage can roflstomp them. Some of the flaws of the mesmer is that it's actually rather predictable and it's also limited in the amount in the conditions. A sustain mirage brings both the burst and the condi cleanse to deal with this.

It is one of the best solo duelists, that is true, but I do find it absolutely hilarious that people claim it's the "dominant roaming spec". Because my experience remain the complete opposite. I just came off from 2h duo roaming and you know how many condi mirages I saw? None. Zero. Absolutely nada. All of them where either 5-10 man full melee sustain balls (zerg meta but replace scourge with a combo of reapers), soulbeasts, spellbreakers, holos, reapers, revs. Hell there was barely any thieves either. I saw more vanilla guardians roaming than I saw mirages and thieves combined. Not even sure those melee balls had chronos.

I mostly roam on wvw when I play and to be fair I find some condi mirages. They have one thing in common tho, they're all rather bad even outnumbering. I'm pretty sure there are some good ones, luckily or not, I never found them.Mostly I encounter DE, SB, SPB and Holos.

@Lincolnbeard.1735 said:I mostly roam on wvw when I play and to be fair I find some condi mirages. They have one thing in common tho, they're all rather bad even outnumbering. I'm pretty sure there are some good ones, luckily or not, I never found them.Mostly I encounter DE, SB, SPB and Holos.

I'm not the best player in the world, but I'd say I'm safely above average. I ranked platinum 1 playing tempest auramancer in my only ranked PvP season and on condi mirage (PvP rules) I have defeated many experienced players of all classes who are in the top 250 in duels.

However, in WvW condi mirage feels much stronger than under PvP rules. I almost never lose 1v1 and it's not uncommon for me to solo roam for a few hours at a time without a death even though I will attack groups of up to 4 enemy players (If they're inexperienced and overconfident, I can sometimes defeat that many!).

It could be that I'm better than most of the competition I encounter, but it seems pretty clear to me that condi mirage is remarkably strong under WvW rules especially. Yet it's almost completely worthless for anything other than roaming. In zerg play I might as well not be there at all. I feel less effective in PvP. I'm a good side-noder. I can win most of those fights. But the question is often how quickly can I win them? And if I chose to fall into a different role, then I become even less effective. Against good competition, I feel like I could have more impact with another class.

@AliamRationem.5172 said:

@Lincolnbeard.1735 said:I mostly roam on wvw when I play and to be fair I find some condi mirages. They have one thing in common tho, they're all rather bad even outnumbering. I'm pretty sure there are some good ones, luckily or not, I never found them.Mostly I encounter DE, SB, SPB and Holos.

Sometimes I play condi mirage while roaming, depending on the server, can 1v4+ and do good, other times I play power mirage and can do the same, again depending on server, playing power actually gives an edge when facing these small teams with healers imo.Playing s/d weaver can reach similar results although it takes a lot longer.So I don't think condi mirage is that busted as everyones says, it's just most players in wvw are lackluster.

Edit: I consider myself just a bit above average, not even that good, Odik, who posted on these same forums, for example kills me easily.

@"AliamRationem.5172" said:However, in WvW condi mirage feels much stronger than under PvP rules. I almost never lose 1v1 and it's not uncommon for me to solo roam for a few hours at a time without a death even though I will attack groups of up to 4 enemy players (If they're inexperienced and overconfident, I can sometimes defeat that many!).This applies to every class, yes. Just go to any forum and find a "WvW outnumbered" video, lol.

The thing is, the condi mirage always punishes those without condi cleanse and lesser skilled players due to the way most behave - they pile on top of each other and then all of them get hit by AoE and the mirage can just keep putting heavy pressure on all of them instead of them rotating. Its like a weird culture thing in WvW. You can even see it during the calmer times. 5 people catapulting a tower? You can bet your kitten most of them will be stacked on top of each other just waiting for a phantasmal berserker to punch all of them below 50% hp. Thats how you see who is a real roamer and who isnt. The roamer will stand waaaay back. And there is usually no one there. And when you yourself do that, some kitten will always come and stand next to you because reasons.

Thanks for all the comments guys! I feel like I have a bit more to work with now. Just need to practice :)

@"Dawdler.8521" said:

It is one of the best solo duelists, that is true, but I do find it absolutely hilarious that people claim it's the "dominant roaming spec". Because my experience remain the complete opposite. I just came off from 2h duo roaming and you know how many condi mirages I saw? None. Zero. Absolutely nada. All of them where either 5-10 man full melee sustain balls (zerg meta but replace scourge with a combo of reapers), soulbeasts, spellbreakers, holos, reapers, revs. Hell there was barely any thieves either. I saw more vanilla guardians roaming than I saw mirages and thieves combined. Not even sure those melee balls had chronos.In a roaming guild group I encountered repeatedly yesterday during 2h of play, 4 of the 5 players were condi and power mirages. I should absolutely base what I consider to be dominant in roaming on that anecdotal evidence.

Aoe is your frand. Mirage with axe is going to have poor mobility. Kite away when he goes invis with torch 4 because you know he's trying to setup the axe 3 combo. If you just stay mobile a LOT of his axe attacks will miss and he'll have to blow jaunt/blink to get close. Trick to fighting mirage is making them "run out of steam" before they can land any big damage on you. If you make them blow their dodges and invis and ports trying to catch you, you can turn around and light them up. If you can't spot the mirage hit any clone with lbow 3 to stealth up, then lbow 5 to kill all his clones, order your pet to attack when he goes vis, dep on pet he may need to blow a dodge, try to land lbow 4 -> lbow 2 after your pet eats some of his dodges. If he gets away swap weaps, evade spam with sword, kite clones, look for another opening. Survival skills/traits help a lot for the condi clear. Entangle is great, easy to see the real one when he dodges while immob or ports out.

You need to control the fight-space, not them. Do not let them surround you or corner you. Keep moving away from where their clones are (that doesn't mean runaway/backpeddle). Mirage is super cooldown dependent, bait them out and it's just a bag.

I have returned to say thanks once more! I not have a less frustrating time fighting mesmers and have managed to take down a few thanks to the advice from everyone.