Hectorim Sears.1479

Mesmer needs a rework of it's core mechanic of clones/phantasms I think. As it is right now it is impossible to balance, which makes EVERYONE unhappy. Devs can't balance it for PvP without neutering it in PvE (remember how Confusion worked on release?), Mesmer players are unhappy because their profession keeps getting nerfed, yet even though it IS getting nerfed non-Mesmer players are unhappy because it is STILL not fun to play AGAINST Mesmers. While in GW Mes was a nightmare to balance in both PvE and GvG, the solid foundation of skill mechanics and build diversity/synergy with other professions made it less of a pain. I think in GW2 Mesmers were - and are - flawed right from the base; the whole clone/phantasm as a core mechanic. Unless this is changed, Mesmer power level will need to be nerfed again and again... Which has been the case since 2012.

It is my conviction that many professions were "parsed" incorrectly in the last patch. Waiting for serverside confirmation wink On topic: problem persists.

Just pointing out the cd on missed stealth attacks was one of the most cleaver things balance team did.Before you could spam till it connected rendering aegis, blocks, evades useless.I would have liked to spam mind shatters till it hits without destroying the clones if it didn't but it would be awful for the game. See this is what i mean... No it was a dumb change.. Thief average stealth time was 3 sec with no initiative burn.. More stealth time if u pistol 5 and heart seeker.. They killed d/d that day.. And the set everyone hated at the time was s/d and d/p.Almost every class has a block/invul. Some have aegis or both... Most blocks or invul are longer then 3 secs. And alot of classes have aoe and reveals,aoe reveals hard hitting cleave.. Oh not to mention dodge and ports....Oh plus can't be stealthed in wvw with towers and guards, and mounts reveals lol It was a dumb nerf never reverted So again hahahahahCan you give a few examples of blocks/invuls lasting 3 seconds or more for that matter? Besides, comparing skills with long CDs to a mechanic that can be present on multiple skills on one loadout is scarcely fair.

Truth be told, Thieves were and still are really bad at supporting, so if any class should have portal, I think they should. The problem is not thieves getting a portal, the problem is mesmer portal got deleted because portal, according to the knowledgeable community, was op, especially when paired with high mobility.Tbf mesmer doesn't have any support at all on pvp too. Thief's version is supposed to be limited because it will only let one other person through, aside from the thief herself. I still think it will get nerfed though, at some point.

1 sec distort to avoid a single timed attack. Remove condi out of combat when traited (that super annoying 15 sec remaining cripple), on demand stability with otherwise useless shatters for your build when traited (and other useful boons for you). A bit of alacrity and when traited quickness from them. Quite a few things I used them for that were just interesting/fun/nice to have. When you put it like that, I guess it was quite useful, if not only for quality of life and de-clunking (I didn't know shatter cleanse worked out of combat). if you have a condi on you, you're still in combatOf course. It was late in my time zone, apologies.

After looking at this rotation, maybe Anet's idea is to swat unintended mechanics (skill-swapping after CS, massive amount of pre-emptive Alacrity) while disguising it as a balance pass...

In HoT, pretty much every e-spec was an addition OVER the core, and I think that is still rippling far and wide today. On one hand, the game needed some fast freshening up - so making e-specs a BETTER version of core was one way to do it... albeit you could say that if Anet managed to release an xpac sooner, and keep a strict cadence, all of this could possibly be averted. Even after Anet changed their mindset, some PoF e-specs are still pretty much additions to the core - Holo and SB kinda come to mind, although to a lesser degree compared to HoT times for sure. I don't think some of the design decisions can really be retconned easily... OP e-specs, Mesmer clone/phantasm dichotomy, Necromancer being firmly planted into condi by design, Engineer's kits being kinda-but-kinda-not a profession mechanic, Thieves pretty much not having support options by design... and so on. I have to say, I can't say where most of the changes from today's patch are meant to steer the game, despite the designers prefacing them with their reasoning. I just hope I'll understand the concept while playing, I guess.

Truth be told, Thieves were and still are really bad at supporting, so if any class should have portal, I think they should.

I don't think even a machete would be enough to nerf Scourges at this point :DI'm telling myself Anet is just gearing up for that monumental task. As for Engineers, I'm pretty sure Scrappers will go into the attic for now.

I used it all the time in open world. Double time warp for no reason, double gravity well into approaching mob hordes. I played a round Dragonfall and tbh is was annoying. Clones die fast in monster packs or they despawn instantly when the zerg murders the enemies they are attached to. If you want to use shatters at all might as well just smash the F keys as fast as you can to get at least any use out of them. I liked the longer csplit duration and alac/quickness from the shatters for purely selfish reasons. But ugh, this plays not very well now. I understand dry shattering an F5, it was pretty much a thing ever since this e-spec was introduced, and that nerf I understand - no more double-casting on demand is a giant nerf (truth be told double-casting an Elite is pretty OP...), but weren't other F abilities pretty niche when cast like that? On the other note - if things haven't changed, the F abilities light up before the clone actually shows, which would make Staff 2, Sword 3, Scepter and clone-on-dodge more important now as fast ways to enable shatters, right? More realistically it highlights just how deficient our clone generation mechanics are. Staff 2 is decent, but staff itself is awful in most areas of the game. Sword 3 requires you to be very close to the enemy and has a cast time, so it's useless for any kind of fast reaction. Scepter auto is slow and needs 3 autoattacks to make a clone, so that's totally useless. Scepter 2 is great...but not for clone generation. You can block the attack, but by the time you get your clones the attack is over. I think a range increase on Sword 3 would solve my biggest gripe with it. As for Scepter, I will always love it, even if it is considered a redhead stepchild of Mesmer weapon family. You can use auto-attack chain outside of combat! That has to count for something. I always hated Staff for having a power-oriented Phantasm on a condi-predominant weapon... Chaos Storm should have been a skill for Scepter mumble.

1 sec distort to avoid a single timed attack. Remove condi out of combat when traited (that super annoying 15 sec remaining cripple), on demand stability with otherwise useless shatters for your build when traited (and other useful boons for you). A bit of alacrity and when traited quickness from them. Quite a few things I used them for that were just interesting/fun/nice to have. When you put it like that, I guess it was quite useful, if not only for quality of life and de-clunking (I didn't know shatter cleanse worked out of combat). And as you mention "useless" shatters... Reminds me why I stopped playing the profession in the first place - it just never meshed well with itself, ever. You either used clones OR phantasms, either used shatters OR did not at all, and if you did, only half of them were somewhat useful for your build. I'm still sad about that. After playing with Mesmer for a few days after launch, I created an Engineer, then I unlocked Grenades and the Flamethrower and never looked back. Sigh, well, thanks for being constructive and nice. Most Mesmers are so salty right now they are probably looking for a head to chew off.

I used it all the time in open world. Double time warp for no reason, double gravity well into approaching mob hordes. I played a round Dragonfall and tbh is was annoying. Clones die fast in monster packs or they despawn instantly when the zerg murders the enemies they are attached to. If you want to use shatters at all might as well just smash the F keys as fast as you can to get at least any use out of them. I liked the longer csplit duration and alac/quickness from the shatters for purely selfish reasons. But ugh, this plays not very well now. I understand dry shattering an F5, it was pretty much a thing ever since this e-spec was introduced, and that nerf I understand - no more double-casting on demand is a giant nerf (truth be told double-casting an Elite is pretty OP...), but weren't other F abilities pretty niche when cast like that? On the other note - if things haven't changed, the F abilities light up before the clone actually shows, which would make Staff 2, Sword 3, Scepter and clone-on-dodge more important now as fast ways to enable shatters, right?

I do agree that Mesmers in GW2 aren't what they used to be, but truth be told 2012 wasn't the start of Mesmers' troubles... As much as it was innovative, Mesmer's concept was also problematic in GW itself - it was a great, diverse PvP profession, but Anet was struggling to make it relevant in PvE... Sounds familiar? Mesmers are great - and frustrating - when playing as/against human opponents, and that has not changed. Anet tried radically changing the mechanics in GW2 to bridge the gap bewteen PvE and PvP but... I still think that they failed, as much as it hurts (I mained Mes in GW and fell in love with the game because of it too). I think Anet somehow admitted to that when the changes to Phantasms came a few months back. I honestly think the profession will remain problematic as long as clone mechanic stays in play. Phantasms seem fine after the changes, but clones are still as clunky as ever.

Those chrono changes (not only today, but today they ruined it finally) show how out of touch balance team is... even freaking scrapper got some improvements, even this piece of junk, and chrono is just MONUMENTALLY RUINED. Holy kitten... Most of the Scrapper rework is net nerf. That's not counting the -300 Vitality. "Dry" Shattering is important to some, and in some situations absolutely necessary. Take this for example, pre nerf, you could distort off yourself, so say you have a ranged class on you "ie Ranger", and your reflect is on cool down, and of course, ANET loves their rangers so you know Longbow hits way further then tool tip. What do? Pre Nerf, you could distort, buy time, get cover, heal, kite, etc. But now that it is solely dependent on clones, guess who's range wins? Say you could get a clone off, those clones die at stubbing a toe. This makes us more or less sitting ducks unless we pull some clones off, time it, shatter it, and hope that did the job cause the second we shatter them, we need to repeat that that entire PROCESS to even get some sort of cover/defense/attack again since it is now 100% tied to only shattering. In short, killed the class, er, spec. That's my point - F4 with no clones is 1 sec of evasion. If you're against a LB Ranger with no CDs left aside from F4, doesn't that mean that you're dead anyway?

Is "dry" shattering so important? Seriously, reading all of the above comments, I'm kind of amazed. Back in vanilla, many builds did not use Illusionary Persona at all...

GW2's meta seems especially resistant to change, so we will see but... I do not expect huge shakeups, aside from maybe changes for Rangers, Engis and possibly Warriors.

They didn't even correct the whole "Overload" mistake in the patchnotes, so I wager nothing has changed at all between official and preliminary notes?

Thank you for suggestions. I'm currently checking them out and that's exactly what I was looking for!

Hi guise, I've been in a love-hate relationship with GW2 since release. I recently started getting into sPvP, but it has a pretty steep learning curve. Is there any reddit/wiki/repo/YT channel that deals with explaining map strategies and build guides (like DnT does for PvE content)? While I'm not the worst player, I often get a feeling I'm not doing what I'm supposed to do at any given point. That makes the whole PvP shtick kind of awkward. Any help would be appreciated. Cheers and love, Jack