Allarius.5670

Bummer about Mesmer scepter and staff. I fully understand the reasoning for Mirage, it's just that two clones and two phantasms helped keep Chrono functional after the shatter change. Oh well.

That is the mechanic for the elementalist's elite spec, Weaver. Trade out the Weaver traitine to get normal attunements back. If you haven't played Tempest, another ele elite spec, it also messes with the attunements in a different way.

Control effects (particularly instant cast daze) that are used to interrupt key skills are always useful, even for confusion heavy builds. More so if you know what you are trying to interrupt. Regarding CI, on top of applying cover conditions the immobilize helps land iDuelist bleed burst and staff ambush attacks from the mirage and clones. A large amount of damage can come from bleed and burn when these hit, diversifying damage sources among multiple conditions. If you cannot clear them all (made less likely by cover condies) then you are taking some kind of damage when a good burst lands (made easier my immob). This idea and build concept has been around since pre-HOT but was usually very fragile. Mirage helps with that.

It doesn't really feel like a trade off. Outside of F4 and removing baseline Illusionary Persona, the shatters just feel too much the same ... The only thing that really feels different is tempo. That is cool and totally fits the Chronomancer theme, but still feels like it comes up short-handed compared to something a little more dramatic or interesting.

Account name ckod was rank 12 the other day on Chaotic Interruption on NA. It's doing better than mesmer usually does.Chaotic interruption need a nuke from the orbit. Immobilize proc. Thats truly dumb and shouldnt be like that, a lot of bad mesmers suddenly became "so good" at the class with this CI focused builds - bunker chrono,cmirage.After this trait would be destroyed mesmer can hope start get buffs(nerf reverts?) and fix power block bug >:(Only I see a problem in condition duration amulets ? Everything boiled down to maximum condition duration - Scourge and Mirage are now both in the same boat - maximum condition duration. I always have thought condition duration amulets shouldnt had been introduced.Maybe a fat stack of torment in place of immobilize?

If the game is free to change overtime, I don't know why anyone would think the player base and their preferences doesn't. Maybe it'd be better to revisit game defining player polls on an annual basis to keep up with the times. Claiming the player poll as an excuse but being unwilling to revisit player preference feels ... bad? If we are going to be democratic about it, then be democratic about it. If there are other reasons then don't use the poll as an excuse, just be straight up with it.

They discuss specific lessons they learned from GW1 and at at the end how they expect that to carry over to GW2.

Interesting read regarding profession niche and balance approach going from GW to GW2. What do you think? Regarding its impact to PvP, are we still seeing this approach or have things taken a detour (for better or worse)? https://www.killtenrats.com/2009/09/17/guild-wars-interview/

Scepter lacks sufficient defensive mechanisms to provide alternative playstyles and suffers from long delays on damage skills to provide realistic counter offense. This has consistently forced scepter into Fresh Air to see any major use and consequently restricts viable build alternatives for the Elementalist. A few suggestions to improve scepter playability in competitive modes by increasing defensive options to improve its viability and role diversity when compared to dagger with minimal impact on PvE. Fire, Scepter 2: Ashen Armor - 2 sec channel, 10 sec cd. Block the next attack and counter by burning and blinding nearby foes.Damage: (1.00)Burn (5 sec)Blind (5 sec)Number of Targets: 5Evade: 1/2 secBlock Duration: 2 secRadius: 240 Fire, Scepter 2 sequence: Dragon's Tooth Water, Scepter 2: Shatterstone - 1/2 sec cast, 5 sec cd. Cast a shatterstone that will chill foes and make them vulnerable when they trigger it.Damage: (1.66)Vulnerability: 5, 15 secChill: 1 secArming Time: 1 secDuration: 15 secNumber of Targets: 5Radius: 180Blast Radius: 240Range: 900 Rock Barrier cast time reduced from 1 sec to 1/2 sec and cooldown reduced from 15 sec to 10 sec. Earth, Scepter 3: Sand Shield - 2 sec channel, 15 sec cooldown. Block the next attack and grant nearby allies a barrier.Barrier: 778 (0.18)Tectonic Shift: 2 sec, Gain barrier each second.Evade: 1/2 secBlock Duration: 2 secNumber of Allies: 5Radius: 240 Earth, Scepter 3 sequence: Dust Devil - Bleed and Blind your foes with a blast of sand.Damage: (0.4)Bleed: 3, 8 secBlind: 10 secPiercingNumber of Targets: 5Range: 900