Should Mesmer's overall damage be shifted to Player?

Hey, I saw some suggestions regarding this case and I thought about making a poll. I'm not a Mesmer main but I really liked the idea. So it's just out of curiosity.

I'd love to know how it looks here and what Mesmer players think about it.

So, should Mesmer's all damage be shifted from clones and illusions to Player? I feel like the thing with illusion could be much more fun and reactive if it was just the player doing the damage while illusions and clones are really just a distraction.I think the damage could be a lot more reliable.I know the AI of clones and illusions isn't the best and experienced players can really quickly notice the Mesmer itself.

But would you want it?

This has been discussed multiple times already. In fact, it was this discussion that was likely responsible for the phantasm overhaul earlier.

There is virtually no difference between you clicking a button that summons a phantasm that does one attack vs you doing the attack yourself.Since in both cases you are controlling when the attack occurs and not AI, there should theoretically be little difference from the opponents point of view.The only thing that is changing is the animation in which the attack occurs.At the end of the day, the only difference is the graphical design of the attack.

Even with mirage, the player is still always deciding when the attacks occur.The net effect is just a fancier animation for the attack that comes from multiple directions.It might 'appear' to come from the illusions, but it's really just coming from you and your decisions.

Although an attack coming from multiple directions can be annoying, AI can no longer be used as an excuse for difficulties balancing the class because there is no AI anymore.

@Xstein.2187 said:That might be more about mirage. I had a thread about it, feel free to read, may be he was inspired by it. But its possible for mirage only as they wont rework the entire class to make something like this to happen.

I disagree with the assessment that AI attacks are player controlled, in some ways yes, but in other ways no. It is the player determining when to start the attack, but the AI has to track, find, then start and finish the animation, and does not move while performing an attack like we as a player would. The result is that a phantasms starts an attack, but the enemy runs out of range and the phantasm now misses completely. If however it has been coming from the Mesmer themselves, the animation would have been performed while moving to keep the target in range and the attack would have finished and hit. Examples of this are Phantasmal Swordsman and Phantasmal Mage attacks just to hit easy ones. Same for clone ambush attacks through Infinite Horizon, they stop to perform the attack and do not follow while performing the attack (except Mirage Thrust which can just flat out miss if they step on a rock or get slightly above the clone). Then we have damage from shatters, where again the clones need to close that distance and we as a player are completely reliant on the AI pathing for the damage to ever get there. Thus our build and style of play ends up being necessary to get in melee range and dump a bunch of clones there to pop, and all the while hope that our enemy is bad enough to allow so many of these things to happen. Or in the case of clones ambush damage, we are reliant on the enemy not using LoS and AoE autoattacks to kill them all.

Reliability of damage is a huge problem for Mesmer, part of that is clones, part is phantasms, all of it is AI issues with a mobile thinking opponent. In PvE almost none of this matters but the dps is lower on Mesmer outside of Chrono (due to multipliers and enemies not cleansing slow, which means it doesn’t work in PvP).

Shift the damage to the Mesmer, the reliability of the damage will increase, numbers can then be tuned to do less burst and thus cooldowns reduced to make more dps.

How to achieve the change:

Make clones indestructible, either having no health bars or going to 1 health and never dying, immune to cc and movement impairing effects. Clones run to the Mesmer for a shatter and empower the next attack which then applies the shatter effects. Ambush damage and condition application removed from clones, player ambush attacks now scale with number of clones out (when traited with IH). Animations remain for clone ambushes, but they are just for show. Phantasm cast times removed, but both the phantasm and the player perform the animation and damage is only applied by the player, phantasms like clones would be immune to CC and slows, movement imparing effects do not really matter as the damage is really applied by the Mesmer.

Everything here keeps the animations of the profession, but significantly increases reliability of the damage sources so they can finally be tuned as having damage, instead of sometimes having damage and sometimes being crowd controlled, line of sighted, outranged, or killed in combat.

I really do appreciate the idea that AI executed attacks are extensions of the player, but it is only true when there are no delays between the pressing of the skill and the eventual damage. There are just so many opportunities for enemies to avoid the damage in so many ways. The phantasm overhaul was actually a result of trying to nerf Mesmer in a way that would break stealth summoning, since the phantasm summons now apply some damage on cast.

Edit: Another thing I forgot, clones do not prof sigils or runes, damage from phantasms are based on inherited stats and do not gain damage form the players boons.... so on and so on. Huge difference between AI damage sources and player controlled ones.

Deleted, broken browser page.

@Delofasht.4231 said:Ambush damage and condition application removed from clones, player ambush attacks now scale with number of clones out (when traited with IH). Animations remain for clone ambushes, but they are just for show.I see someone sharing my view (not sure about empowering user ambush depends on the clones this would be harder to implement, AneD need something simple as static numbers)Pretty much agree with your post.

They are no going to do that. That will need reword not only traits, plus all the weapons skills and ambushes. A great part of your aoe, range and tagging are from your illusions. It'll be a disaster with their small actual team working in a lot of things. Better remove the profession than make it undesirable to play in any game mode. Although watching the amount of votes and the few people that still play the profession it'd not change anything and continue empty.

The latest balance patches show clearly that they are throwing darts and doing things without a lot of sense. Seems a group without ideas doing something with the purpose of show that they did something.... With changes that have a clear filling purpose. That is. I even saw some upcoming changes with the only purspose of address a thing that only matters in zerg but then ruinning a skill or skills out of the zerg while you are travelling or doing content and fighting in WvW at small scale or solo in the same game mode. Ruin a skill for a single situation without think in a global solution it has no sense. It's ridiculous. And things like that are coming for more than one profession.

At this point and watching that, i prefer that they don't touch and destroy/ruin more things from mesmers. Nothing good has been done for us in a long time.

I don't see this as a representative survey today. Because there will be more votes of those who want the worst for the mesmer favoring their professions more than anything else, about all from competitive modes, and there isn't enough real mesmers for vote and defend the profession in a public survey.

@Delofasht.4231 said:I disagree with the assessment that AI attacks are player controlled, in some ways yes, but in other ways no. It is the player determining when to start the attack, but the AI has to track, find, then start and finish the animation, and does not move while performing an attack like we as a player would. The result is that a phantasms starts an attack, but the enemy runs out of range and the phantasm now misses completely. If however it has been coming from the Mesmer themselves, the animation would have been performed while moving to keep the target in range and the attack would have finished and hit. Examples of this are Phantasmal Swordsman and Phantasmal Mage attacks just to hit easy ones. Same for clone ambush attacks through Infinite Horizon, they stop to perform the attack and do not follow while performing the attack (except Mirage Thrust which can just flat out miss if they step on a rock or get slightly above the clone). Then we have damage from shatters, where again the clones need to close that distance and we as a player are completely reliant on the AI pathing for the damage to ever get there. Thus our build and style of play ends up being necessary to get in melee range and dump a bunch of clones there to pop, and all the while hope that our enemy is bad enough to allow so many of these things to happen. Or in the case of clones ambush damage, we are reliant on the enemy not using LoS and AoE autoattacks to kill them all.

Reliability of damage is a huge problem for Mesmer, part of that is clones, part is phantasms, all of it is AI issues with a mobile thinking opponent. In PvE almost none of this matters but the dps is lower on Mesmer outside of Chrono (due to multipliers and enemies not cleansing slow, which means it doesn’t work in PvP).

I agree that this sort of landed reliability can be a problem and anoying. However, I still wouldn't call this an AI issue as I still wouldn't say artificial intelligence is in the question based on the definition of AI. If a player playing warrior presses great sword 3, pixels on the screen do a whirlwind attack animation. If a player playing mesmer presses great sword 4, pixels on the screen do a whirlwind attack. Both are dodge-able and in both cases running toward the enemy doesn't 'add' to the speed of the whirl attack (it is a fixed speed for both). So, why does mesmer sword 4 seem like it misses more? Well for one thing the attack animation is waaaaay longer than warrior. This is because instead of you just acting as a swinging dodgable projectile heading towards the opponent, you swing your sword first and THEN a swinging dodgable projectile heads towards your opponent. This pretty much doubles the cast time from the opponents point of view. Yes, this makes it so you can potentially do another attack while your projectile (the phantasm) is moving towards your opponent. However, IMO, it would be much better quality of life if when you press gs4 as a mesmer, the phantasm is instantly summoned and THEN while you are swinging your great sword, the phantasm is whirling towards your opponent at the exact same time so that your animations line up with that of the projectile. The way it is set up now, although phantasms still act as projectiles, they always act like delayed projectiles. Same with sword and mage. The distance the phantasm pops up is based on your distance from the target. However, once again, you have a cast time and THEN your phantasm projectile is fired instead of both happening simultaneously like it is with every other class I can think of.

Yes, it is also possible for stuff, like a rock, to get in the way of the attack. The problem with this though, once again isn't that it is an AI attack, but that although the phantasm always shows up at a predictable distance from the target, its cardinal directions are random. It can come from the left, right, in front, etc.For example, you could remove the unpredictability completely and have the phantasms, say, just come from their left sides/your right side 100% of the time. Although perhaps more reliable from obstacles, this wouldn't be changing AI, just the randomness of what direction the attack comes from. Therefore, if there is an obstacle in the way on the right side, you can anticipate and wait or change directions before you do the attack so you don't waste it. However, with this scenario you would also loose the unpredictability in cardinal direction from your opponents point of view as well. Therefore, both have there ups and downs.

Mirage is weird. It is kinda mixed, and only with one specific trait, IH, traited. At this point in time and since IH works so much better with condi, I would rather just nerf the ambush attacks and give the condi damage back to the player's normal attacks to compensate. As it is right now, IH is just too paramount of a trait with condi builds. Clone ambush attacks being too powerful also indirectly makes deceptive evasion far too important to trait with mirage as well IMO.

@Delofasht.4231 said:Shift the damage to the Mesmer, the reliability of the damage will increase, numbers can then be tuned to do less burst and thus cooldowns reduced to make more dps.

How to achieve the change:

Make clones indestructible, either having no health bars or going to 1 health and never dying, immune to cc and movement impairing effects. Clones run to the Mesmer for a shatter and empower the next attack which then applies the shatter effects. Ambush damage and condition application removed from clones, player ambush attacks now scale with number of clones out (when traited with IH). Animations remain for clone ambushes, but they are just for show. Phantasm cast times removed, but both the phantasm and the player perform the animation and damage is only applied by the player, phantasms like clones would be immune to CC and slows, movement imparing effects do not really matter as the damage is really applied by the Mesmer.

Everything here keeps the animations of the profession, but significantly increases reliability of the damage sources so they can finally be tuned as having damage, instead of sometimes having damage and sometimes being crowd controlled, line of sighted, outranged, or killed in combat.

I really do appreciate the idea that AI executed attacks are extensions of the player, but it is only true when there are no delays between the pressing of the skill and the eventual damage. There are just so many opportunities for enemies to avoid the damage in so many ways. The phantasm overhaul was actually a result of trying to nerf Mesmer in a way that would break stealth summoning, since the phantasm summons now apply some damage on cast.

Edit: Another thing I forgot, clones do not prof sigils or runes, damage from phantasms are based on inherited stats and do not gain damage form the players boons.... so on and so on. Huge difference between AI damage sources and player controlled ones.

I think this is great for another elite spec, but it is just never going to happen across the board. If it also happens across the board, clones becoming invulnerable would also cause most of the clone producing traits to have the opposite affect and become almost completely useless. Additionally, maybe it is because I don't play the game as much as I did when phantasms were what I would truly consider AI, which was more annoying, but I just don't have as much of a problem with reliability as many make it seem. Yes, opponents can dodge or avoid a phantasm attack. However, all projectiles need to be dodgeable, avoidable, and have a range limit that players can move out of. That is just counterplay. Catching on rocks? Not so much. However, I really don't notice this happen as often as people may make it sound and don't think it affects the game even close to as much as say old school phantasms did. Finally, yes, I agree 100% with the edit you added.

p.s. Perhaps contrary to popular belief, if clones ran towards the opponent while performing the ambush attack, although it would be a more reliable source of damage, it would actually have MORE of the characteristics of AI.All together, some of the mesmer attacks could be far more reliable (the immobilization on sword 3 is the first thing that comes to mind). However, the definition of AI isn't the same as the definition of reliable.

@Xstein.2187 said:

@Delofasht.4231 said:I disagree with the assessment that AI attacks are player controlled, in some ways yes, but in other ways no. It is the player determining when to start the attack, but the AI has to track, find, then start and finish the animation, and does not move while performing an attack like we as a player would. The result is that a phantasms starts an attack, but the enemy runs out of range and the phantasm now misses completely. If however it has been coming from the Mesmer themselves, the animation would have been performed while moving to keep the target in range and the attack would have finished and hit. Examples of this are Phantasmal Swordsman and Phantasmal Mage attacks just to hit easy ones. Same for clone ambush attacks through Infinite Horizon, they stop to perform the attack and do not follow while performing the attack (except Mirage Thrust which can just flat out miss if they step on a rock or get slightly above the clone). Then we have damage from shatters, where again the clones need to close that distance and we as a player are completely reliant on the AI pathing for the damage to ever get there. Thus our build and style of play ends up being necessary to get in melee range and dump a bunch of clones there to pop, and all the while hope that our enemy is bad enough to allow so many of these things to happen. Or in the case of clones ambush damage, we are reliant on the enemy not using LoS and AoE autoattacks to kill them all.

Reliability of damage is a huge problem for Mesmer, part of that is clones, part is phantasms, all of it is AI issues with a mobile thinking opponent. In PvE almost none of this matters but the dps is lower on Mesmer outside of Chrono (due to multipliers and enemies not cleansing slow, which means it doesn’t work in PvP).

I agree that this sort of landed reliability can be a problem and anoying. However, I still wouldn't call this an AI issue as I still wouldn't say artificial intelligence is in the question based on the definition of AI. If a player playing warrior presses great sword 3, pixels on the screen do a whirlwind attack animation. If a player playing mesmer presses great sword 4, pixels on the screen do a whirlwind attack. Both are dodge-able and in both cases running toward the enemy doesn't 'add' to the speed of the whirl attack (it is a fixed speed for both). So, why does mesmer sword 4 seem like it misses more? Well for one thing the attack animation is waaaaay longer than warrior. This is because instead of you just acting as a swinging dodgable projectile heading towards the opponent, you swing your sword first and THEN a swinging dodgable projectile heads towards your opponent. This pretty much doubles the cast time from the opponents point of view. Yes, this makes it so you can potentially do another attack while your projectile (the phantasm) is moving towards your opponent. However, IMO, it would be much better quality of life if when you press gs4 as a mesmer, the phantasm is instantly summoned and THEN while you are swinging your great sword, the phantasm is whirling towards your opponent at the exact same time so that your animations line up with that of the projectile. The way it is set up now, although phantasms still act as projectiles, they always act like delayed projectiles. Same with sword and mage. The distance the phantasm pops up is based on your distance from the target. However, once again, you have a cast time and THEN your phantasm projectile is fired instead of both happening simultaneously like it is with every other class I can think of.

@Delofasht.4231 said:Shift the damage to the Mesmer, the reliability of the damage will increase, numbers can then be tuned to do less burst and thus cooldowns reduced to make more dps.

How to achieve the change:

Make clones indestructible, either having no health bars or going to 1 health and never dying, immune to cc and movement impairing effects. Clones run to the Mesmer for a shatter and empower the next attack which then applies the shatter effects. Ambush damage and condition application removed from clones, player ambush attacks now scale with number of clones out (when traited with IH). Animations remain for clone ambushes, but they are just for show. Phantasm cast times removed, but both the phantasm and the player perform the animation and damage is only applied by the player, phantasms like clones would be immune to CC and slows, movement imparing effects do not really matter as the damage is really applied by the Mesmer.

Everything here keeps the animations of the profession, but significantly increases reliability of the damage sources so they can finally be tuned as having damage, instead of sometimes having damage and sometimes being crowd controlled, line of sighted, outranged, or killed in combat.

I really do appreciate the idea that AI executed attacks are extensions of the player, but it is only true when there are no delays between the pressing of the skill and the eventual damage. There are just so many opportunities for enemies to avoid the damage in so many ways. The phantasm overhaul was actually a result of trying to nerf Mesmer in a way that would break stealth summoning, since the phantasm summons now apply some damage on cast.

Edit: Another thing I forgot, clones do not prof sigils or runes, damage from phantasms are based on inherited stats and do not gain damage form the players boons.... so on and so on. Huge difference between AI damage sources and player controlled ones.

I never mind disagreeing with you XStein, because you are civil about it overall.

My assessment of illusion attacks compared to normal attacks is that they have a greater number of imposed rules to follow and thus create greater variance based on situation. They also have more coding required for each individual attack, creating greater potential for bugs and breaks in the gameplay. All this while not following normal rules of attacks, that of starting when the cast is finished (phantasms and clones have their own cast times that need to respect being in range to start the cast first and then not moving with the target at all).

To make Mesmer illusion attacks work like other abilities would require retuning ever single attack individually... a rework nightmare as tuning for each individually is a mess. Changing everything to zero for illusions means just tuning the Mesmer abilities to increase their damage either on the end of the cast, or as the result of an animation already in use on phantasms and clones but applied when the skill resolves or is pushed (for channeled attacks like Phantasmal Warden). Thus all current effects get directly inherited to the Mesmer, and numbers tuned down on damage output as reliability is increased. Reliability increases, damage decreases, less situational damage variance (extremes between different gameplay areas).

Really it always comes back down to illusions being able to be interacted with as the visuals of the profession are fine overall. Though tweaking the animations to better fit the effects of my proposed changes to application of damage would benefit players readability of Mesmer damage output.

Two other changes that I really feel should be applied is that of allowing illusions to be created and follow the Mesmer outside of combat with my proposed changes and that they do not attack targets that the Mesmer is not on (since they would do no damage anyhow, it is really only about the animations).

@Zoser.7245 said:They are no going to do that. That will need reword not only traits, plus all the weapons skills and ambushes. A great part of your aoe, range and tagging are from your illusions. It'll be a disaster with their small actual team working in a lot of things.

On the surface, the amount of work seems pretty extensive, but actually it is mostly about copy and pasting lines of code, checking objects and containers to make sure they apply from the right sources after a change. Adjusting and reworking the biggest issue with Mesmer since inception, and the biggest cause for all the nerfs to the profession throughout the years seems like a logical approach. That said, the workload may well exceed that of the current staff, but without knowing the size of their team it really is difficult to assess that at all.

@praqtos.9035 said:

@Delofasht.4231 said:Ambush damage and condition application removed from clones, player ambush attacks now scale with number of clones out (when traited with IH). Animations remain for clone ambushes, but they are just for show.I see someone sharing my view (not sure about empowering user ambush depends on the clones this would be harder to implement, AneD need something simple as static numbers)Pretty much agree with your post.

Thanks praqtos, we may not always agree on things, but it is nice to see that at least in some things we can see eye to eye.

I don't know... When you learn how to spot the clones, focusing the Mesmer isn't terribly difficult. It's when they keep running away and you're getting pummeled. Maybe if the power was more evenly split?

It's only relevant with condi. The dmg off of bouncing staff aa is stupidly high compared to something like sword. Make it so clones can't do condi dmg pls.

How about this, The clones still appear, but they literally do everything you do only no damage. You dodge, it dodges, you use scepter it uses scepter, etc. All the Damage comes from you but the attacks "Hit" at the same time giving the illusion of not knowing which one is the player until it's destroyed. Damage is now easily balanced but the theme of Mesmer is retained. Just my dumb idea.

@"Richard Marcinko.5132" said:How about this, The clones still appear, but they literally do everything you do only no damage. You dodge, it dodges, you use scepter it uses scepter, etc. All the Damage comes from you but the attacks "Hit" at the same time giving the illusion of not knowing which one is the player until it's destroyed. Damage is now easily balanced but the theme of Mesmer is retained. Just my dumb idea.

This was proposed when the game was still in beta and it was asserted that clone complaints were going to lead to repeated balance issues with Mesmer. The idea is not dumb, but it doesn’t resolve issues that players have when playing Mesmer in situations where enemies die faster than clones can be produced to power attacks, or in which the AoE is so great and dense as to kill them as they spawn. Worse yet, it fails to resolve the issues that non Mesmer players have with being able to interact with the Mesmer directly, leading to the same frustrations but without the existing counterplay.

Clones as a resource need to be adjusted, either remove them as a resource, or make them non destroyable and adjust numbers to compensate for their improved reliability.

@Xstein.2187 said:This has been discussed multiple times already. In fact, it was this discussion that was likely responsible for the phantasm overhaul earlier.

There is virtually no difference between you clicking a button that summons a phantasm that does one attack vs you doing the attack yourself.Since in both cases you are controlling when the attack occurs and not AI, there should theoretically be little difference from the opponents point of view.The only thing that is changing is the animation in which the attack occurs.At the end of the day, the only difference is the graphical design of the attack.

Even with mirage, the player is still always deciding when the attacks occur.The net effect is just a fancier animation for the attack that comes from multiple directions.It might 'appear' to come from the illusions, but it's really just coming from you and your decisions.

Although an attack coming from multiple directions can be annoying, AI can no longer be used as an excuse for difficulties balancing the class because there is no AI anymore.

except there is a huge difference. i wouldn’t have to care about 3 other “players” attacking me instead of just one, i wouldn’t have to play Where’s Waldo everything the mirage decides to blink/clone spam or go into stealth or decide to break targeting with that ambush skill :)

@Zawn.9647 said:

@Xstein.2187 said:This has been discussed multiple times already. In fact, it was this discussion that was likely responsible for the phantasm overhaul earlier.

There is virtually no difference between you clicking a button that summons a phantasm that does one attack vs you doing the attack yourself.Since in both cases you are controlling when the attack occurs and not AI, there should theoretically be little difference from the opponents point of view.The only thing that is changing is the animation in which the attack occurs.At the end of the day, the only difference is the graphical design of the attack.

Even with mirage, the player is still always deciding when the attacks occur.The net effect is just a fancier animation for the attack that comes from multiple directions.It might 'appear' to come from the illusions, but it's really just coming from you and your decisions.

Although an attack coming from multiple directions can be annoying, AI can no longer be used as an excuse for difficulties balancing the class because there is no AI anymore.

if you are too lazy to look for mesmer then its YOU problem. and you should be punished for it.

As you can see on other threads on the forums, people complain is not about who does the damage, people just want the damage gone.To think ANerf listens to this "knowledgeable community" is disgusting.

no

but make it that damage to the clones/illusions is reflected back on the mesmer.

@"VAHNeunzehnsechundsiebzig.3618" said:no

but make it that damage to the clones/illusions is reflected back on the mesmer.

right after holo burning to death when using holomode and warrior getting heart attack after gaining too much adrenaline

@Leonidrex.5649 said:

@"VAHNeunzehnsechundsiebzig.3618" said:no

but make it that damage to the clones/illusions is reflected back on the mesmer.

That's actually a good exercise, in the same vein we can do it for other professions:

• when necros lose or spend life force they lose the same amount of hp.
• ele staying in one attunement for too long makes them take damage, example: getting electrocuted when staying in air attunment.
• when ranger pet reaches 80% hp, they'll get fury, might and will attack the ranger instead.
• scrappers' gyros have a chance to get a virus and attack the scrapper.
• thief has a chance to steal a bomb and blast himself off.
• when revenants stays in one legend for more than x seconds, they will lose control over said legend and kill themselves.
• don't know about guardian :/

A lot of mesmer's damage has been shifted to the player over the course of the last 7 years. Mesmer's auto used to all be very weak with no damage modifiers in traits. And we used to keep 3 phantasms out permanently. No phantasms only attack once before disappearing and our autos have traits that modify our skills by adding conditions or raw damage to it. That was all in an effort to shift the damage to the player. I think mesmer is in a good place right now when it comes to balancing damage. In the future, a new elite spec may play without clones entirely. But with the current mesmer specs, i think damage has been shifted enough and is fine.

@Lincolnbeard.1735 said:

@Leonidrex.5649 said:

@"VAHNeunzehnsechundsiebzig.3618" said:no

but make it that damage to the clones/illusions is reflected back on the mesmer.

• when necros lose or spend life force they lose the same amount of hp.
• ele staying in one attunement for too long makes them take damage, example: getting electrocuted when staying in air attunment.
• when ranger pet reaches 80% hp, they'll get fury, might and will attack the ranger instead.
• scrappers' gyros have a chance to get a virus and attack the scrapper.
• thief has a chance to steal a bomb and blast himself off.
• when revenants stays in one legend for more than x seconds, they will lose control over said legend and kill themselves.
• don't know about guardian :/

Guardians set themselves on fire and permanently feared until they cleanse it.

Yes, but only as elite spec. For other specs in the game this isn't going to change much of anything, while making our clones and phantasms entirely cosmetic for questionable reasons and predictably - inconsequential outcomes.

I'd also personally much prefer it being an option (as in, elite spec) rather than a mandatory change across the board. I feel like within a spec one could achieve very interesting new ways of exploring the class, but that doesn't mean that we need to have the rest of the class forcibly lobotomized. (Hi, mesmer nerfs to everything in an effort to balance one spec which now culminated in entire class being janky and random!)

@Gogdarth.6741 said:Yes, but only as elite spec. For other specs in the game this isn't going to change much of anything, while making our clones and phantasms entirely cosmetic for questionable reasons and predictably - inconsequential outcomes.

I'd also personally much prefer it being an option (as in, elite spec) rather than a mandatory change across the board. I feel like within a spec one could achieve very interesting new ways of exploring the class, but that doesn't mean that we need to have the rest of the class forcibly lobotomized. (Hi, mesmer nerfs to everything in an effort to balance one spec which now culminated in entire class being janky and random!)

I would actually want to see bruiser type of mesmer, that would focus on disrupting enemies via halucinations and such, still would be whined about if you died to it tho.

@Lincolnbeard.1735 said:

@Leonidrex.5649 said:

@"VAHNeunzehnsechundsiebzig.3618" said:no

but make it that damage to the clones/illusions is reflected back on the mesmer.

• when necros lose or spend life force they lose the same amount of hp.
• ele staying in one attunement for too long makes them take damage, example: getting electrocuted when staying in air attunment.
• when ranger pet reaches 80% hp, they'll get fury, might and will attack the ranger instead.
• scrappers' gyros have a chance to get a virus and attack the scrapper.
• thief has a chance to steal a bomb and blast himself off.
• when revenants stays in one legend for more than x seconds, they will lose control over said legend and kill themselves.
• don't know about guardian :/

firebrand has to read for half an hour to regain pages, guardian just dies of old age.