On Clone Death Traits

[Sebrent.3625]

For context for those that don't know, we used to be able to take traits that made it so that when our clones died, they would explode in a small AOE and apply conditions (bleed, cripple, weakness). Each was a different trait, but it wasn't hard to fit them into all sorts of builds.

 

I'm curious if anyone else misses these traits. I do whenever I see someone simply tab-targeting and cleave clones to try to "solve" the "issue" of picking the correct Mesmer (because noticing the one not acting like a bot is [apparently] hard <_<)

 

Does anyone know why those traits were removed in the streamlining of the trait system?

 

Thoughts on a revival of such traits?

[Woltarion.6829]

Disruptor's Sustainment, it was my favourite mesmer trait. Everytime you interrupted an ennemy you got +1000 healing power for 5 sec. I played that trait with mantra of distraction and Ether feast. If you had 3 clones and could do that combo, it was possible to heal 13k at once and I loved it.

Edited February 14, 2022 by Woltarion.6829

[Salt Mode.3780]

They were removed A LONG time ago, this was at the lauch of HoT. There use to be a build called the blackwater PU condi mesmer build and what it did was it literally would cripple the enemy and punish the enemy for destroying your clones, fastforward to 2022, those traits will be super abuseable due to the fact that clones die so easily, but it can also work the other way around where clones will die before those passives can hit your target.

Tho the game has progressed far enough to where people shouldnt have issues like in core days, more boons and more cleanses.

If you want to talk about OP condi builds, that is one of them. Probably compare its time to condi mirage i would say that build was way more disgusting then condi mirage, the cripple and weakness spam with tanky stats means you could never die and they could probably never escape if you can lock them down properly.

Edited February 14, 2022 by Salt Mode.3780

[viquing.8254]

I miss them and they gut one third of past mesmer mechanics.

Mean today when I see people totally neutralise our illusions with aoe spam (thieves shortbow spam2 for example.) I dunno what is cheesy...

Keep in mind that even power and hybrid builds used them. Even the most op condi clone spam back in days was countered by ranged single target weapons.

I used to play hybrid, not blackwater (20/20/30/0/0?). A full clonespam hybrid with 20/25/20/15/0 (if I remember well.) has pro and cons.

What they should did about it was just move the traits to deny OP combinaison.

 

Edited February 15, 2022 by viquing.8254

[viquing.8254]

Btw back during this period, mesmer community was bashed by pro shatter who want shatter everywhere and said everything who isn't shatter is noob. So we get it.

We cannot deny they didn't listen forums even if we disagree with forums...

Edited February 15, 2022 by viquing.8254

[The Boz.2038]

Can you imagine them triggering on Virtuoso's "dagger hits an enemy, and thus, dies"? It'd be hilarious.

[Simonoly.4352]

Aww clone death was fun and an interesting take on the punishment mechanics of Mesmer. I remember the super tanky builds that used the traits - they were pretty persistent but the condi output was quite pitiful and you could mostly ignore them and just...walk off. I think it was more of an issue for PvP - clone death traits were quite redundant in the grander scheme of things in WvW.

There were ways to counter those clone death builds through the use of superior mobility and ranged attacks, but the number of people who would just dive into a bunch of clones swinging their melee weapon was quite staggering. Similar bizarre lack of community awareness was seen with glamour traits back in the day: you could drop a portal at a choke point and people would run back and forth through it, stacking up confusion and killing themselves - it was madness and very amusing.

Of course neither clone death nor glamour confusion traits would be much of a threat these days, but oh lord did the community struggle with those 😆

[Senqu.8054]

1. Since ANet deleted these traits, they have not intended to have these traits in game

2. These traits don’t solve problems the Mesmer kit can’t solve 

3. You don’t know what process is going on at ANet

 

4. Not everyone has to like these changes 

 

Better now? /s if this was not clear. 
 

Maybe we want to have some quality answer? From someone who is not disturbed by believes and relies on pure, ice cold facts? @Obtena.7952? 

Edited February 15, 2022 by Senqu.8054

[viquing.8254]

There already were posts comparing numbers and effects about thoses.

People were not dying of :

- https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Confusing_Combatants => Not on blackwater builds btw.

- https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Crippling_Dissipation

- https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Debilitating_Dissipation

 

They were dying by getting lost and rollfacing which is the vast majority of WvW players that's why it get nerfed. Like confusion over the years.

 

And it solved the fact that clone (main mesmer ressource kit) life duration impact build gameplay diversity a lot. Same can be said for illusions HP nerf with Signet of illusion.

Edited February 15, 2022 by viquing.8254

[Obtena.7952]

3 hours ago, Senqu.8054 said:

From someone who is not disturbed by believes and relies on pure, ice cold facts? @Obtena.7952? 

Why were they removed? because Anet didn't want them to be there. Maybe the patch notes give more information because I don't remember whatever the explaination was. 

Any more obvious answers you need me to feed to you?

Edited February 15, 2022 by Obtena.7952

[Dadnir.5038]

They were removed because PvP players complained about dying from them (like many thing that were removed along the years).

The official stance of the devs was probably something like: "We want the mesmer to be all about shattering it's illusion. If the illusions reward the mesmer when they are destroyed by the enemy the value of the mesmer's shatters is lessen and we feel it's not right."

[Sebrent.3625]

I miss them because the thing that most attracted me to the Mesmer when the game first released was how it punished people who just spammed all their attacks at you.

[viquing.8254]

13 hours ago, Obtena.7952 said:

I don't remember whatever the explaination was.

The  unofficial explaination was on a stream anet met a blackwater and said : "It's cheesy".

The official explaination was : "We want to concentrate mesmer more around shattering."

Edited February 16, 2022 by viquing.8254

[Mik.3401]

I don’t really miss these because it was sort of a passive mechanic. I don’t enjoy such stuff just like I dislike blurred inscriptions. I think the fun of Mesmer lies in active interruptions. 

[Sebrent.3625]

7 hours ago, Mik.3401 said:

I don’t really miss these because it was sort of a passive mechanic. I don’t enjoy such stuff just like I dislike blurred inscriptions. I think the fun of Mesmer lies in active interruptions. 

Understandable, but I only half agree.

I found that it made every clone useful more often.

You shatter it? Great. Love shatters.

Something kills it before you shatter it? Great. They are punished.

You overflow on the number of clones you have? Great. They explode as if killed.

This last one actually worked well if you were trying to keep cripple/weakness/bleeding on an enemy while you were using scepter.

[Ithilwen.1529]

I actually argued with an ANET Dev about this point. They claimed clone death was "toxic."  In fact, the demise of clone death traits gutted core Mesmer. 

In addition to that, Moa and portals have been nerfed to near uselessness.  Thief has a better portal now.

I feel there's some animus toward Mesmer, for whatever reason.

Edited February 23, 2022 by Ithilwen.1529
clarity

[Yoci.2481]

It's fine for other professions to destroy our resources. Getting punished for that would be toxic. But why can't we kill Revs energy? Warriors adrenaline? Necros life force? Meanwhile our clones and phantasms are fair game.

[Xaylin.1860]

26 minutes ago, Yoci.2481 said:

Necros life force?

That we actually can 😆

 

I disliked those traits because they discouraged using the class mechanic. Just like old Phantasms did. Or like Mirage does. That being said, they were mostly annoying rather than toxic unless abused from Stealth. 

[Hirosama Nadasaki.6792]

11 hours ago, Xaylin.1860 said:

I disliked those traits because they discouraged using the class mechanic. Just like old Phantasms did. Or like Mirage does. That being said, they were mostly annoying rather than toxic unless abused from Stealth. 

 

I liked them because of that tbh. Adds an optional gameplay strategy based on keeping clones alive. Though I am kinda biased since I never liked the way shatters are implemented in the first place, feels too much like clones are just there for shatter fodder than for the whole misdirection, illusionist shenanigans.

[Xaylin.1860]

Because they mostly are. Still... having skills or traits that lead to you not using the class mechanic is just bad class design. And having counters to counters to counters (and so on) is bad as well. Since, let's be honest here, that's what those traits did. They punished people for properly counter acting Clones (unless you were cheesing it with Scepter AA). There is not much real deception or distraction going on there.

 

That being said, ANet could have introduced a non-Shatter spec with Mirage that focusses on active Clone use. But they didn't. 

[viquing.8254]

Even with clone traits, it was usefull to timing shatter. On my hybrid build I used 1/3 each gameplay equally.

I don't undserstand how blurred inscription is passive. if you rollface your signet you didn't made value of it.

@Xaylin.1860 : The thing is that at game launch, shatter were just a part of mesmer gameplay who were around phantasms, clones and shatters. It's only later that it goes monogameplay with a full shatter orientation.

IMO the best decision would have put thoses traits competing with PU and DE so that you have to make choice and you can't do too much frustrating builds.

 

The main issue with illusion is that it always was our mechanic supply but it always was obliterate in few sec.

Imagine warrior reducing adrenalin bar while being hit,

Imagine ranger taking damage when their pet is hit,

Imagine engi getting Fx randomly destroyed while being hit,

Imagine thief getting revealed while being hit,

etc we can do it for everyclass.

Since launch, mesmer getting his ressources obliterate when opponent rollface aoe is the main issue for build diversity.

That's why people looked at clone death traits, that's why during HoT Signet of illusion life bonus was overused. That's why some mesmer build have to build with mass clone generation so they have something to shatter.

It's a bit carricatural but it's basically it.

 

Edited February 24, 2022 by viquing.8254

[Yoci.2481]

15 hours ago, Xaylin.1860 said:

That we actually can 😆

 

I disliked those traits because they discouraged using the class mechanic. Just like old Phantasms did. Or like Mirage does. That being said, they were mostly annoying rather than toxic unless abused from Stealth. 

Of course by directly attacking the Necro. What I mean is something like a single AoE that would wipe out all our clones, but would just tickle a Necro's life force.

[Obtena.7952]

11 hours ago, Yoci.2481 said:

Of course by directly attacking the Necro. What I mean is something like a single AoE that would wipe out all our clones, but would just tickle a Necro's life force.

I think you need to look at the different impacts these kinds of class mechanics have, pro AND con, for the classes that have them. For instance ... let's say someone did blow an AOE on your clones. Depending on the situation, that could be an advantageous thing to happen for you (because maybe they didn't hit you with it right?). 

On the other hand, Necro's losing LF, no matter how much, is never good. 

So basically, our views aren't black or white here. I mean, if you think Mesmer can justify having clones people can't kill easily because it's not 'fair' based on some comparison to how people can interact with other class mechanics in a negative way ... then you need to remind yourself of the history of the game and its design. 

This is the class concept. Unless it doesn't work how Anet wants, it's not going to change. If that's a problem for players, they have 8 other classes to choose from (or even some options as especs where clones are treated COMPLETELY different than core Mesmer clones, as is the case in Virtuoso). 

Edited February 24, 2022 by Obtena.7952

[Xaylin.1860]

23 hours ago, viquing.8254 said:

The thing is that at game launch, shatter were just a part of mesmer gameplay who were around phantasms, clones and shatters. It's only later that it goes monogameplay with a full shatter orientation.

IMO the best decision would have put thoses traits competing with PU and DE so that you have to make choice and you can't do too much frustrating builds.

I'm not sure that I agree with that. From a design point of view, Shatters are the class mechanic and always have been. It is as simple as that. Illusions provide the class resource. The damage distribution might have shifted a little bit after the Phantasm rework but in the end they are as much a resource as Clones are. Regardless, on death traits have never been more than an add on. They never were an integral part of the class.

 

But you are right that there has been a bigger emphasis on other playstyles on the release. However, as I said, the issue was that with the old iteration Shatters could become completely useless or at least unused. So regardless of trait placement, even if they where competing with PU or DE, I wouldn't like them from a design point of view as long as they discourage using Shatters. And while I don't remember this being brought up by the devs in this context, at least for the Phantasm rework this was the reasoning. Since you brought up other classes: Imagine an Elementalist that never ever switches Attunements. Or a Warrior that doesn't use their Burst. A Necro not using their Shroud at all? That's just bad. Of course, this doesn't mean you have to like Shatters. You don't have to. Just as some Rangers dislike their pet. But it is and will remain the class mechanic.

 

Now, this also doesn't mean that there can't be alterations. However, that's what e-specs are for nowadays and even core Mesmer offers at least some Phantasm focussed options. Personally, I never was a big fan of Shatters even though Mesmer is my most played class. My biggest issue is that ANet didn't make enough effort to alter gameplay with Mesmer e-specs. I had really high hopes for Mirage because I love interruptive tricksy gameplay but they dropped the ball on Mirage Cloak and IH. For Phantasms Chronomancer somewhat works but there could have been so many better ways to implement it.

 

 

23 hours ago, viquing.8254 said:

The main issue with illusion is that it always was our mechanic supply but it always was obliterate in few sec.

This is true for sure and also is the only redeeming factor I can currently see when looking at Virtuoso. This however doesn't mean Shatters are bad or that there has to be punishement if Illusions are destroyed. ANet made them destroyable so destroying them should be valid counterplay. Period. It doesn't matter other classes don't have to bother with something like this. But it has to be balanced properly. In case of Illusions, they're clearly too fragile, at least in anything aside from 1 vs. 1. And we have discussed options to work on this plenty of times on this forum. Just from the top of my head:

• Make Clones invulnerable but have decreasing health
• Simply buff Illusion health to make them less vulnerable
• Make Illusions less vulnerable to AEs that aren't targeted at them (e.g. like DAoC did it)
• Make Illusions less vulnerable against strike damage (so they can't be bursted down as easily)

I can't really tell why ANet hasn't come around to work on this. However, they might simply not see this as a pressing issue if Mesmers still perform well in a sufficient amount of scenarios. Or it is hard to programm. Or they don't want another Turret Engi (PvP). Who knows?

22 hours ago, Yoci.2481 said:

What I mean is something like a single AoE that would wipe out all our clones, but would just tickle a Necro's life force.

The first part is true. Second part doesn't matter to me. First, Necros can actually be focussed down quite sufficiently if you run an offensive build. Second, this has nothing to do with how Mesmers work. They simply are designed a different way. As mentioned earlier: Yes, there are classes that don't have to deal with that. But where is the fun in everything being the same? I'm fine with that as long as Mesmers shine in other scenarios and get a pay-off. Which currently probably indeed isn't the case most of the time when looking at Shatters. However, in the end, on death traits wouldn't really change much about the issue at the core. It would be a bandaid. And a bad one at that.

[Salt Mode.3780]

The reason why people resort to the PU build is because compare to the other classes that can dish out damage mesmers required much more work to dish out that damage output. 

Things like thief backstab or necro core spamming s1, mesmer just required more setup. It felt unrewarded if u had miss your combo which wasnt hard if you are far enough for people to react, not to mention the CD is longer. I played shatter mes throughout core days.

And in Core days the gameplay was much slower then it is now.