What are we good at these days?

[Genthore.2384]

I have been playing as a mesmer since gw1 still have my Me/R Velvet Wonton in pre.I was an interrupting machine in that campaign - I knew my strengths and I played to them- in this game- every strength we have they have either given to everybody else or nerfed into the ground. Sad when the thing that is your strength helps other players more than you- clones for example- other players can use them to trigger heals etc yet they dont confuse anybody and they still target you and do garbage damageWhat are we better at than any other class besides maybe wiping out trash mobs in Queensdale.? I am not trashing the class- i LOVE Mesmers but they have not done right with our class. They have made Mesmers pretty much useless except for a pull or a port - I cant even get through storymode without an assist like I used to - I am thinking of changing my main after 8 years plus .I think the only mesmer Ill be playing any longer is in pre - or did they nerf empathy and backfire too.sad

[Woltarion.6829]

I don't really know, but i'll try to say something positive about mesmer for once. Just for you know, I play 99% times PvP content so my opinion will be about PvP only. IMO, I think that we're good at survivability, but at the cost of not being able to contest points. I always play pvp with Inspiration so I have distortion with F4 + all the signet that also gives distortion. Signet of midnight that cleanse 5 condi + distortion + invisible. Signet of illusion reset cd on F4 for more. Moreover, all the shatter can cleanse a condi thanks to restorative illusion. I also like Prismatic Understanding, it allows me to stay more invisible with the signet + mass invisibility + torch4 wich is really valuable. With this kind of gameplay, i'm really hard to kill, so i guess that it can be something that we are good at but I don't really deal a lot of damage, and disto + stealth = no contest possible.

[Genthore.2384]

pvp is more about player skills than the game being biased against you- the game obviously hates mesmers and has made them the joke of the gameI wish there was something good to say about them too- thanks for the reply

[draxynnic.3719]

Taking the question at face value: Mesmers are still fairly valued in 10-man instanced PvE. Boon chrono doesn't have the monopoly it used to have, but it still has its strengths in 10-man (5-man groups seem to prefer firebrigade for role compression). Mesmers also tend to bench pretty highly in DPS when they have all the boons provided by the rest of the team. Problem is that when running solo, they don't have the ability to self-buff and deal damage solo that other professions have.

Surprised that you're saying you're having trouble with story, though - it can sometimes require a bit of build customisation, but I generally haven't found it that hard to get through story content with mesmer. There are definitely other professions that I usually have more problems with if I'm going to have problems at all.

[necromaniac.7629]

@draxynnic.3719 said:Problem is that when running solo, they don't have the ability to self-buff and deal damage solo that other professions have.this not true though

[lare.5129]

so condi mesmer valid buidl on cm100, good spvp (may be too good), const member for some raid bosses ..

[Leonidrex.5649]

Raidboon chrono very goodpower chrono VERY goodcondi mes very good

Fractalsboon chrono badcmes badpmes bad

Open worldfuck knows

wvweverything suckschrono seems playable in blobsand cmes is plaable for roaming ( if dealing 0 dmg and taking 0 dmg is for you )

pvpeverything sucks

[Junkpile.7439]

We have ok burst damage. What else mesmer needs?

[draxynnic.3719]

@necromaniac.7629 said:

@draxynnic.3719 said:Problem is that when running solo, they don't have the ability to self-buff and deal damage solo that other professions have.this not true though

Well, looking at power boon chrono... it's basically Quickness and a little bit of Alacrity. It generates a little bit of Might on charging a mantra, but that doesn't last long unless you need to recharge the mantra, and that isn't exactly recommended play. You can get Fury on your phantasms, but not on yourself. You can adjust your build to get these things, but it involves making sacrifices.

Compare this to, say, Reaper, which can get high might, high vulnerability on target, 100% crit chance, and quickness fairly conveniently.

The flipside, though, is that because all the stuff Reaper has is already part of its power budget, it does well solo, but doesn't benefit much from having allies giving out boons and inflicting vulnerability on its behalf. While mesmers really shine in that environment, because they're suddenly swimming in boons that otherwise have significant opportunity costs for them, while potentially still adding a party boon or two to the group themselves.

Another consideration is that getting high mesmer DPS usually involves using Signet of the Ether to recharge phantasms, which you can generally get away with in an organised group where you have a dedicated healer to keep you topped up, but can be risky playing solo. Most professions aren't put in the position of having to decide between using their heal skill to do damage or to keep it in reserve for when they need it for healing, so they can afford to do the latter.

Which all adds up to mean that mesmers have a bigger gap between raid performance and solo performance than... well, at least SOME other professions. I haven't done the analysis for every single profession, it's possible this isn't exclusively a mesmer issue. But I'm pretty sure it doesn't apply (or at least not as strongly) to any of the heavy professions, and necromancers have the opposite issue of being really strong solo (or solo with a healer for reapers in competitive modes) but not benefiting much from boons in raid scenarios.

[necromaniac.7629]

@draxynnic.3719 said:

@necromaniac.7629 said:

@draxynnic.3719 said:Problem is that when running solo, they don't have the ability to self-buff and deal damage solo that other professions have.this not true though

Well, looking at power boon chrono... it's basically Quickness and a little bit of Alacrity. It generates a little bit of Might on charging a mantra, but that doesn't last long unless you need to recharge the mantra, and that isn't exactly recommended play. You can get Fury on your phantasms, but not on yourself. You can adjust your build to get these things, but it involves making sacrifices.

Compare this to, say, Reaper, which can get high might, high vulnerability on target, 100% crit chance, and quickness fairly conveniently.

The flipside, though, is that because all the stuff Reaper has is already part of its power budget, it does well solo, but doesn't benefit much from having allies giving out boons and inflicting vulnerability on its behalf. While mesmers really shine in that environment, because they're suddenly swimming in boons that otherwise have significant opportunity costs for them, while potentially still adding a party boon or two to the group themselves.

Another consideration is that getting high mesmer DPS usually involves using Signet of the Ether to recharge phantasms, which you can generally get away with in an organised group where you have a dedicated healer to keep you topped up, but can be risky playing solo. Most professions aren't put in the position of having to decide between using their heal skill to do damage or to keep it in reserve for when they need it for healing, so they can afford to do the latter.

Which all adds up to mean that mesmers have a bigger gap between raid performance and solo performance than... well, at least SOME other professions. I haven't done the analysis for every single profession, it's possible this isn't exclusively a mesmer issue. But I'm pretty sure it doesn't apply (or at least not as strongly) to any of the heavy professions, and necromancers have the opposite issue of being really strong solo (or solo with a healer for reapers in competitive modes) but not benefiting much from boons in raid scenarios.You can get perma 25might, fury and quickness easy by simply going illusions dueling, the only downside of chrono is that its harder to have100% crit chance uptime compared to other classes, also, adjusting your build for solo is not a "sacrifice" Mesmer definitely doesn't have the biggest gap between solo and raid performance, you atleast need knowledge of what you're trying to solo and the spec itself, and if you can't solo on chrono just go mirage easy, how can you say mesmer has one of the biggest raid vs solo gaps when mirage-the best solo spec, exists?

[Justine.6351]

I am becoming a huge nerd for interrupting people while being traited with power block.

Mantra of distractionF3Gs 5Tides of timeGravity well

I even double down on the tryharding with the sigils that steal life and give 250 precision/ferocity on interrupt.

[draxynnic.3719]

@necromaniac.7629 said:

@draxynnic.3719 said:

@necromaniac.7629 said:

@draxynnic.3719 said:Problem is that when running solo, they don't have the ability to self-buff and deal damage solo that other professions have.this not true though

Well, looking at power boon chrono... it's basically Quickness and a little bit of Alacrity. It generates a little bit of Might on charging a mantra, but that doesn't last long unless you need to recharge the mantra, and that isn't exactly recommended play. You can get Fury on your phantasms, but not on yourself. You can adjust your build to get these things, but it involves making sacrifices.

Compare this to, say, Reaper, which can get high might, high vulnerability on target, 100% crit chance, and quickness fairly conveniently.

The flipside, though, is that because all the stuff Reaper has is already part of its power budget, it does well solo, but doesn't benefit much from having allies giving out boons and inflicting vulnerability on its behalf. While mesmers really shine in that environment, because they're suddenly swimming in boons that otherwise have significant opportunity costs for them, while potentially still adding a party boon or two to the group themselves.

Another consideration is that getting high mesmer DPS usually involves using Signet of the Ether to recharge phantasms, which you can generally get away with in an organised group where you have a dedicated healer to keep you topped up, but can be risky playing solo. Most professions aren't put in the position of having to decide between using their heal skill to do damage or to keep it in reserve for when they need it for healing, so they can afford to do the latter.

Which all adds up to mean that mesmers have a bigger gap between raid performance and solo performance than... well, at least SOME other professions. I haven't done the analysis for every single profession, it's possible this isn't exclusively a mesmer issue. But I'm pretty sure it doesn't apply (or at least not as strongly) to any of the heavy professions, and necromancers have the opposite issue of being really strong solo (or solo with a healer for reapers in competitive modes) but not benefiting much from boons in raid scenarios.You can get perma 25might, fury and quickness easy by simply going illusions dueling, the only downside of chrono is that its harder to have100% crit chance uptime compared to other classes, also, adjusting your build for solo is not a "sacrifice" Mesmer definitely doesn't have the biggest gap between solo and raid performance, you atleast need knowledge of what you're trying to solo and the spec itself, and if you can't solo on chrono just go mirage easy, how can you say mesmer has one of the biggest raid vs solo gaps when mirage-the best solo spec, exists?

I'd call that making sacrifices. I'd presume you're running 2-2-1 on Illusions to pull that off (although Pack runes can also help as long as you open with a phantasm), but in the process you've given up Domination, which is normally a good source of damage boosts, for power builds at least. I also don't see this approach being taken in competitive modes, and when I was talking about "solo", I was thinking about sPvP and WvW roaming (where you usually can't rely on getting big boon stacks from allies, especially on roamer builds) as well as open world/story. Note that making a sacrifice does not mean that you can't come out better off in the end for the content you're doing - this is kinda the point of altering builds, sacrificing one thing for something else that is hopefully going to serve you better - but you certainly can't take a raid build into a solo environment with little or no modification and expect it to perform.

Which is not to say that I think mesmer is bad in solo environments, but it usually shines for reasons other than pure DPS, as opposed to raids where power chrono is the highest benchmark at the moment.

[TheAgedGnome.7520]

Mirages are very good at soloing champs.

[otto.5684]

Mirage is good in most pve content. Chrono is also good in most pve content. PvP all Mesmer builds struggle.