[Boon build for chrono]

You need assassin gear for 100% crit. After that, if you have spare stats, you can get some boon duration if you are struggling. I just tested it for a while. You shouldn't need more than 25%, like ever. If you really need more, run a phantasm utility instead.

[Why Cancel Changes to Well of Action?]

14 minutes ago, rotten.9753 said:

2 seconds of alacrity on phantasm summon is far more than it needs so you definitely don't have to do a perfect rotation. With 0% BD, I can upkeep 20-30s of alacrity on myself and that's with Improved Alacrity trait which reduces its duration.

Interesting. How many phantasms are you running? I assume you have some utilities. I am mainly bummed about out of combat alacrity tbh, where you would use the well right before the fight begins and also when the bosses are immune to damage or on downtimes etc.

[Why Cancel Changes to Well of Action?]

10 hours ago, Roadkizzle.2157 said:

Well of Action got buffed in this patch along with Well of Senility.

Their damage is going to be able to meet or exceed Mantra of Pain and Disenchanter.

 

A single source of Alac on a 20s cooldown at the final pulse of a Well is laughably bad. There's no way you'd have been able to contribute a usable amount of Alac with that.

But now we'll probably be seeing more people use Wells as DPS.

The well was suppose to be supplementary to stretched time. As it stands, Mesmer is back to "needs to do perfect rotation and can only grant boon when in combat and targets to hit". Anet literally said they want to move away from this, but we are back to exactly where we left off.

[Why Cancel Changes to Well of Action?]

Yes. You might actually need 100% boon duration for alacrity now. What is Anet doing. 

[Why Cancel Changes to Well of Action?]

In the preview of the patch, well of action was going to grant alacrity instead of superspeed, but that seems to have been cancelled? Why? Since wells no longer grant alacrity, they are in a very bad place now. Well of precognition is the only one you use now I guess 

[True Solo Power Mesmer Build]

2 minutes ago, Roadkizzle.2157 said:

How do you get above the 16 Might stack to 25 Might?

I just see the Well of Action providing 8 Might if you're still in it when it ends and Swordsman providing 8 Might if it hits.

You need to keep a few things in mind.

Switching weapons. With greatsword, mirrorblade provides might. 

If fights take long, improved alacrity makes swordsman become ready again before might expires, adding up. And well of action perfectly becomes ready as you use it so long as you are under alacrity, which is pretty easy with this build.

The other way is using continuum split. 

[True Solo Power Mesmer Build]

There are many virtuoso builds out there, but I will share my Chrono build, which has a very high skill ceiling but if played well is ridiculously powerful.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PiwAExzlNwYYNsFWJOyKdtPA-zRRYbRNGOszIMVQESBVeAEGBgp77AUB-e

The build will have 95% to 100% uptime on 25 might, fury, alacrity and quickness. It has a lot of block and can pretty much break the bar of anything solo. It also has 100% crit chance, which allows it to fully utilize improved alacrity trait. The damage is pretty high too and you can alternate between ranged kiting, or getting in with melee for burst windows, using your blocks and cc. 

You can make some changes to the build as you see fit. I feel like greatsword and mainhand sword are needed, but you can replace off-hand sword with shield. Sadly, the build needs some +5 precision infusions to reach 100% crit chance, but you can get some pretty cheap from WvW. Your healing comes from wells, all wells heal and the cooldown of your wells will be really low when you have 100% alacrity uptime. However, the build is extremely good at mitigating damage to begin with.

If you have trouble with boon uptime, you can spam soul pastries food. It's 100 concentration and 70 power and it's a few coppers. You can be under it's effect pretty much forever.

[Where do Chrono Quick and Alac builds actually work?]

8 hours ago, Mungo Zen.9364 said:

So the takeaway is that Mirage and Chrono offer no viable heal build with Alacrity, or without. Meanwhile, Virtuoso running Illumination has potentially the highest HPS of any Mesmer healer and is less positionally restricted.

My complaint is that being just quickness, just alacrity or just a healer doesn’t appear to be good enough to always get a spot.  I do think that either Alac or Quick support should be tied to viable healers (3 support roles/2 support slots per group).  Even both Alac and Quick could have viable healing builds to allow for players to opt in or out of healing as the group needs. 
 

Perhaps I am wrong about this but why would a group take a support that can only ever offer 1 type of support?  

Correct. But generally, either quickness provider heals or alacrity provider heals in fractals, not both. The other one focuses on boon/damage.

[Where do Chrono Quick and Alac builds actually work?]

15 minutes ago, Mungo Zen.9364 said:

Question, does Heal Quick Chrono work either?  If Heal Alac and Heal Quick Chrono are neither viable then we end up being second tier support to professions who can Heal+. 

No, heal chrono is not good. So if you want to do alacrity Chrono in fractals, you want to be full damage build that provides alacrity. I recommend mix of Assassin and Diviner gear, so you have 100% crit chance with fury and some boon duration. With this build, you want quickness firebrand that can heal. Good combo. Then you get 3 dps.

[Where do Chrono Quick and Alac builds actually work?]

Power Alacrity Chrono could work in Fractals as replacement to power alac renegade. You have similar dps, more cc and various utilities.

[Where do Chrono Quick and Alac builds actually work?]

.

[Where do Chrono Quick and Alac builds actually work?]

55 minutes ago, Ombras.2853 said:

Again, you are speaking without even playing the spec in that specific content.

Mirage is heavily nerfed in PvP games with this patch, due to the need of having 3 clones at all times. In PvE that’s actually a buff, since instead of pulsing 2,5 sec of Alac per attack you now pulse 4 sec. Mirage used to run Ritualist gear because of this issue, now it reverted to full Viper due to not needing the improved boon anymore. It’s still good (actually better, a lot) against the same bosses it was good against before.

Ofc it’s not like you HAVE to use Mirage against those, but IT IS still the best performing spec in the game vs them.

Yes, but again, you have mech. Mirage needs to be in combat to provide alacrity, now more so than ever as randomly ambushing gives so little alacrity now. Anytime there is a downtime in fighting, which many fights have it, alacrity will fall off, even harder than before as you need clones for it now. Previously you could stall for a while by ambushing with staff without target, now the solo duration is too low. You will sill be great in soulless horror and twin largos, but don't forget Mech has confusion as well, so you are not that much better.

Quickness Chrono has the same problem. You must be in combat and attacking, or you can't give quickness.

[Where do Chrono Quick and Alac builds actually work?]

3 hours ago, Ombras.2853 said:

Not sure why some people feel compelled to speak lies every post.

I agree that Chrono in PvE isn’t in a great spot. Even after the recent patch, what it does is simply not enough even if we were to take into account only golem rotations, whilst in actual games those rotations are impractical.

But Virtuoso is literally the best Dps in the game at the time being, not on the golem, in the actually games. NOBODY will tell you pass to playing Virtuoso, NOBODY. Alac Mirage is also literally the superior spec in a handful of wings, so it’s another fat lie.

PvE problem is about Chronomancer, not Mesmer.

 

Other modes? Yes, there are much, much larger issues. But since you addressed PvE, those are fat lies, again. 

Mirage is nerfed though. Being good at two bosses now.

The issue with Mesmer players is not the dps. Quickness and Alacrity roles, whether coming from mirage or Chrono are rather scuffed, especially compared to other providers of these boons. Mirage's alacrity uptime is very fragile and it's taken for the damage. A single interruption means alac uptime will go down, whereas Mech does not have this problem. Mesmer has to be in combat, hitting things, and even then the alac uptime is low. Alac mirage is notorious for having low alac uptime.

[Well of Action and Well of Senility are Useless]

 

5 hours ago, Mell.4873 said:

Okay it's not strong, meh it's pointless arguing really.

Also, i said Improved Alacrity is strong I never said Danger Time was.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PiABwyx7lNwYYNMNWJW6WatPA-zRRYbRPGOszIMpQEqAVeQCkeAVA-e

This is the solo build that has permanent alacrity/quickness/fury/might and also permanent 100% crit chance while under fury. You do need some WvW infusions for it though, if you don't have them, change the gear a bit. This build is merely a template, tweak it as you like, but some fundamentals are necessary.

You don't need toughness or vitality from gear, Jadebot vitality is enough. You have so much defensive abilities on this build, it's more than enough. All of them recharge so fast and you can reset them on top of it. You also get extra healing from wells trait. Well of Precog is insanely powerful when used properly.

You can also do a greatsword variant of this build, replace illusions with domination if doing so. Oh and Mimic on the build is a placeholder, you can run whatever you want for one of your utility slots. 

(And for those who don't know, sigil of celerity does not actually need interrupt, if you CC the enemy it works. Also works on break bars, so it's basically free quickness every 20 seconds a lot of our skills have cc on them and coupled with other sources , the result is permanent quickness)

[Well of Action and Well of Senility are Useless]

1 hour ago, Mell.4873 said:

Did even read what I typed? I said under certain conditions. You can't maintain self-Alacrity so what good would Improve Alacrity do. 

You get alacrity on shatter, and if your team has an alacrity provider, you should have 95%+ uptime. If not, the alacrity provider is failing. Gaining alacrity on shatters basically counters alacrity lasting for less time on you, so you get as much alacrity as anyone else, which should be close to 100% in group content. If solo, self alacrity is stronger than Chronophantasmia as well. Solo chrono can have permanent quickness, alacrity, fury and high stacks of might. It's a specific build though.

So you only take well of action in group content with a failing alacrity provider?

[Well of Action and Well of Senility are Useless]

2 hours ago, Mell.4873 said:

I will agree after the Quickness and Alacrity nerf they never really got buffed, just a hard swap. 

Well of Action does have it uses due to Danger Time trait but Well of Senility is highly subjective to the content. 

Weirdly though I'm okay with it becouse you don't really use the Mirage Utilities as well. 

Danger time has become situational as well though. The 10% crit damage while under alacrity has become a serious contender for all Chrono builds, even pure DPS. From my own testing, Assassin gear with improved alacrity provides more damage than danger time with berserker gear. Not only you get all your cooldowns faster, your crits deal more damage. I say contender but it might actually be better than danger time in vast majority of cases now.

Improved alacrity is perfect now, but danger time and illusionary reversion kinda need buffs now. Little reason to take them.

[Well of Action and Well of Senility are Useless]

8 minutes ago, Infusion.7149 said:

Superspeed on chrono was a terrible idea by Arenanet and even more so when it is delayed 3 seconds on a stationary well.

Well of Senility is underwhelming because the damage is poor in PvE and in competitive modes you need to wait 3 seconds for the boon rip. If it had damage on par with Well of Corruption on necromancers it might see use in PvE. 0.7 coefficient * 3 pulses is 2.1 coefficient meaning it appears to be balanced around Improved Alacrity cutting the cooldown in half.

I think well of action has an identity problem. The name and description are clearly about manipulating time, and it used to give quickness. The next thing that can fit was superspeed if not quickness. It can't give anything else worthwhile with it's current theme.

Senility can work, as you said. But not it's current form. Too weak even with improved alacrity. Calamity and Precog are just much better and the ONLY time you would take action or senility is if you somehow want all utility slots to be wells.

[Well of Action and Well of Senility are Useless]

I am primarily a Chronomancer player, if the avatar did not make it obvious lol. It's like my spirit class, so this is tested by me extensively. And I play it on every mode pretty much.

Here is the gist of it. These two wells are just useless no matter how you look at it. Their effects are underwhelming and even if you want to do alacrity you never have to take them. If you play Alacrity, you can run the heal well + well of calamity and well of precognition. I never thought I would say this, but well of Calamity is actually better than well of senility and action. It deals very impressive AoE damage now, and it has the shortest well cd, which is great for providing Alacrity. Most importantly, you do not need a 3rd well as you have enough alacrity source this way, so you have an extra utility slot to bring whatever you need. Gravity well is obviously fine too, but as an elite it doesn't really matter for this post.

And if you are not an Alacrity Chrono, there is absolutely no reason to run well of senility or action yet again. Precog for aegis and Calamity for damage are still much better options when needed, and dps and quickness builds will not use these two wells 99% of the time.

Well of senility and action just don't do anything right now. Low damage, delayed superspeed and delayed boonrip are not what Chrono needs. And the slow and chill effects last a very short time, and you are not gonna run expertise on Chrono. Besides, the cripple and weakness from Calamity lasts longer and more helpful. If superspeed becomes pulsed and longer duration, it would help. Chronomancer being able to provide permanent superspeed would be a refreshing change for a time based class, and removes monopoly form scrapper. Well of Senility could pulse boon removal (1 boon removed per pulse, total 3 pulses) and the ending could be a long chill. Or something else. The point of this post wasn't suggesting changes, just that well of senility and action currently have no real place in Chronomancer kit atm.

 

[Is there any point use anything else than celestial?]

Cele will always be good on ELe, even core due to how the class is made.

You can also try trailblazer, it's a famous build to basically solo everything in the openworld. Earth + Fire focus + defensives from other elements.

Celestial Catalyst is a match made in heaven 

[Hefty nerf on Catalyst again]

Honestly, Catalyst capping around 40k-42k should keep things calm. If speedrunners can pull 46k, people will keep nagging about it. It's a very good dps, and quickness dps should be able to keep up or be higher than other quickness providers.

[Why DPS Firebrand feels awful to play - Issues and suggestions]

8 hours ago, Gaiawolf.8261 said:

Not quite. FB has access to ~60-80% of a single tome, just spread out among the 15 tome skills, depending on which skills they pick. Page regen and page costs now limit them to less than any single tome. If it was 100% of just one tome, most would probably be happy.

The end result is pretty good for most HFB, but pretty terrible for most CFB, QFB, and hybrid FB. Almost anyone that wants decent use out of Tome of Justice, even if they ignore the other two tomes. QFB has it the worst, since they can't pickup Archivist or Renewed Focus to mitigate the slower page regen. After burning through their first set, they are down to 20% of a single tome (i.e. 1 skill, either Ashes or Aftermath depending on the encounter).

Tomes should not be this integral to damage. I think the fact that Axe is the only weapon can dish out consistent condition damage is an issue. Guardian is not engineer, they shouldn't be limited to kits or tomes as they have access to a second weapon set. I think Firebrand needs a proper 2nd weapon set for damage.

[Tired Of Pepega Invuln Design Classes]

The design is a bit one dimensional, and not just the way you described. Chrono was completely outside of pvp when it lost distortion, and then came back instantly when it got it back. It doesn't just mean distortion is strong, it also shows how much Chrono relied on being invulnerable during it's combos. Mirage always had distortion and didn't feel the same. So if invuln was strong, Mirage should have been dominating, which it has not been ever since the nerfs, that came with one dodge.

Now look at a class like spellbreaker, they have so much passive defenses that they can ignore your damage for quite some time and proceed to their thing, and do have some active mitigation to boot. Spellbreaker does not need invuln windows to it's damage and not get deleted. Without an invuln window, spellbreaker will always defeat Chrono, because it has similar damage with more passive defense. 

[Return our second dodge and fix mesmers!]

Might come back to playing the game if we get the 2nd dodge. At least for a while.

Although some traits in Mirage need a look too.

[Why Mesmer is a joke]

1 hour ago, Eddbopkins.2630 said:

It creates to much clutter on the screen with clones, specially if there's more then one. I wouldn't mind having a clone limit on the map of some kind to prevent the clutter mess.

That depends on who you fight or if clones are ranged or melee. This is rare problem. A minor cleave will pretty much prevent melee clones from spawning. If you want to try this yourself, try fighting a spellbreaker with axe clones, see if you can ever get to 3 clones.

[untamed is busted]

It's just a better ranger in pvp mode, at least slightly overperforming.