Greatsword improvement suggestion

[Jeyzer.1605]

An issue I've always had with GS on Mesmer is how half of its skills are long ranged (#1, #3 and #4) while the rest is melee (#2, #5 and shatters on non-Virtuoso). It's fine to have mixed range, but GS, and Mesmer overall have no way to jump back and forth between melee and ranged, like Thieves for example, can with Shadowstep, Sword #2, etc. In fact, GS has no way to gap close by itself to get in range for #2 and #5. This is weird, given the nature of Mesmer to be a mid-range mage who wants to get melee occasionally for shatter burst, but stay ranged most of the time due to their squishiness.

Especially since the burst phase of GS is to #2 (Mirror Blade) into Blink -> F1 (Mind Wrack) + #3 (Mind Stab), which is easily avoidable by the enemy given you can just dodge when the slow blade from #2 is about to make contact, thus dodging the whole combo except the final stab. If the Mesmer doesn't immediately blink right before #2 is about to hit, there will be no bounces. If the enemy times the dodge properly, they'll not only avoid the initial blade + clone creation, but also no bounce will happen and they'll dodge through the immediate F1 as well. 

I do think it's nice that this kind of counterplay exists for GS burst, given how Mesmers overall can be obnoxious to deal with for many classes in general, but I find it overly punishing considering that Blink is Mesmer's only mobility outside of Mirage (and Mirage mobility wouldn't help here anyway since Mirage Advance cast time is too long to be used as a Blink replacement for the above combo, no bounce will happen). So if you GS #2 -> Blink, and your opponent avoids the GS #2, which is fairly easy given the slow cast time and travel time of the blade, you're stuck in melee, on a squishy class with a ranged weapon.

It's also weird that your #2 skill, which is on a 8s CD, can only truly function when combo'd into a really long CD (Blink) or if the enemy is on top of you, but the slow cast time of #2, and the fact that you can only cast it when facing the enemy, make it unpractical for melee usage.

Regarding GS #5, it's a melee skill meant to create distance between you and the enemy, should they gap close on you, but a 450 knockback won't really do much honestly, no melee class that wants to be on top of you is unable to immediately gap close 450 right away on a follow up dash / blink.

Changes proposal:

• #1 Spatial Surge: Stay as is.
• #2 Mind Stab: Move the #3 into slot #2, and change the CD to 6s and lower the damage accordingly. Remove the cripple, or lower its duration to 2s. Spawn a clone on hit.
• #3 Phantasmal Berserker: move the #4 into slot #3, leave the CD as is (15s on a #3 slot is fair game for WvW, on par with most #3 slot skill on other 2H weapons), lower the damage of both the blade throw and the phantasm whirl.
• #4 Mirror Blade: #2 would be moved into slot #4, with its initial damage buffed while the cast time (1s or so) and CD (20s) would get nerfed accordingly. It would be a more situational skill for when it's time to gap close and deliver a burst through #4 and shatters. Lower the travel speed of the blade so it's easier to dodge for enemies, while letting you follow up with a cast timed blink without missing on the bounce. No clone spawn.
• #5 Illusionary Traversal [New Skill]: 1/2s cast time, 30s CD. Blink and deliver a downward diagonal stab through your target, leaving an illusionary blade. After 2-3 seconds, the blade shatters into fragments, damaging surrounding foes. If the explosion hits an enemy, this skill becomes Illusionary Return for 1-2 seconds.
  • Follow up - Illusionary Return: 1/4s cast time. Blink back to your initial position. 

This would allow GS to function better as a ranged weapon, while keeping most of the skill functionally the same. Your bread and butter skill becomes Mind Stab, which is a lot more fun and reliable to spam, although dealing significantly less damage. Zerkers phantasm damage would also get lowered to be more of a poke / boon removal option than burst. When it's time to burst, your #5 slot allows you to get in close range, for the bounces and shatters. The loss of burst from Mind Stab + Zerkers would be partially moved into the combined stronger blade + traversal stab.

The new full burst rotation would hit harder overall, but would be easier to dodge (cast time on the traversal + slower projectile on the blade) and on a longer CD. Additionally, GS would now have a self sufficient way of getting into melee for the Mirror Blade + Shatter combo, without relying on Blink. Regarding the damage on #5, the initial downward stab would have little damage, and most of the skill damage would be located in the delayed explosion.

Blink (utility skill) would still be useful offensively, because #5 having a cast time means good players could dodge through it, so Mind Stab (new #2 that spawns a clone on hit) -> Blink -> Shatter would be a good fast finisher if you're willing to give up your escape tool to secure a kill.

The return follow up on #5 is a situational reward for hitting the delayed explosion of your burst, which can easily be countered by:

• Dodging or blocking the blade explosion, which has a clear tell and 2-3s delay.
• Getting out of the way of the explosion (Would have a small radius, about 240, so dodging the initial burst would already put you outside of the explosion radius).
• CC'ing the Mesmer before or during the explosion, preventing him from activating the follow up (1-2s window to use it, a bit similar to how Rifle #3 functions). The 1/4s cast time is to ensure a Mesmer can't blink back while CC'd.
• Bursting the Mesmer back during that 2-3s window before the follow up becomes available.

In 1v1s, the blink back could easily be denied, forcing the Mesmer to either burn his utility to escape, or stay in melee. However, this would shine in group content such as WvW or sPvP, if enemies are stacked close to the blade, and you combine it with F4 to prevent CC during your escape window.

I think that this go in -> burst -> go out pattern suits Mesmer better, given the trickster aspect of the class and the proximity nature of shatters. Also, since the spell is enemy-targeted rather than ground targeted, it couldn't be used as an additional free escape tool.

Finally, since we now have MH dagger for ranged DPS in PvE, and Spear is coming soon and will clearly replace the burst weapon for Power DPS on PvE (and PvP, since GS burst is melee anyway), I believe it's now a good time to look into the GS without hurting any builds as side effects. The only remaining builds that would use GS are ranged power builds in PvP / WvW, where dagger is largely unpractical.

GS would then become a ranged poke power weapon, with occasional melee burst windows, that would be more rewarding while possessing more counterplay in 1v1s, where Mesmers are the hardest to deal with.

What do you think?

 

Edited July 12 by Jeyzer.1605

[Fueki.4753]

I don't see a single Improvement in your ideas. All it would result in is destroying the most fun weapon on Mesmer for me.

Your new #5 would feel annoying to me and I like my Illusionary Wave.

Unless they change it to be enemy-targetted, making Mind Stab the number 2 ability would feel terrible. Ground-targetted abilities already feel annoying to use on longer cooldowns, I don't need them on shorter cooldowns.

Mirror Blade is far more fun to use for me than Mind Stab, so it having a long.

Phantasmal Berserkers already get their damage reduced when traited, we don't need even more reduction.

In summary, one ability stays the same, four get worse and none get better.

Edited July 13 by Fueki.4753

[ascii.1369]

13 hours ago, Jeyzer.1605 said:

An issue I've always had with GS on Mesmer is how half of its skills are long ranged (#1, #3 and #4) while the rest is melee (#2, #5 and shatters on non-Virtuoso).

Not sure I agree with your assassment. The point of #5 is to push away enemies that come too close, it's not ment to be used in a damage rotation at range. And #2 has the same range as #1, #3 and #4, not sure what the reasoning is for calling it melee. Also not sure what the random reshuffle of the ability slots is about.

All in all I definitely like current GS better than this suggestions.

[Lincolnbeard.1735]

Way to kill power mesmer and to mess up muscle memory.

[mirage.8046]

All I see are nerfs, to be honest. I don't want my skills shuffled around and unnecessarily lose crippled on a hard-hitting skill. Skill 5 is meant for melee players who come up to you and you knock them back to keep fighting said players at long range.

[Sifu.9745]

Since when GS #2 is melee?  1200 range is melee range? And GS #5 is 450 range: hard to call it melee range. And Shatters are also melee????? Are we playing the same game?

 

[Fueki.4753]

11 hours ago, Sifu.9745 said:

Since when GS #2 is melee?  1200 range is melee range? And GS #5 is 450 range: hard to call it melee range. And Shatters are also melee????? Are we playing the same game?

 

I can see an argument for Shatters being melee, because the Shatter resolves at your location and the clones run into melee range to explode. But that's not exactly a strong argument.

[draxynnic.3719]

On 7/13/2024 at 9:55 PM, ascii.1369 said:

Not sure I agree with your assessment. The point of #5 is to push away enemies that come too close, it's not ment to be used in a damage rotation at range. And #2 has the same range as #1, #3 and #4, not sure what the reasoning is for calling it melee. Also not sure what the random reshuffle of the ability slots is about.

All in all I definitely like current GS better than this suggestions.

It's because if you're up close to an enemy and there's nobody else around, the projectile will bounce back to you (granting might), then to the enemy, and so on. It's the most effective way to use the skill to deal damage to a single target.

Unless you're spiking someone out of stealth in PvP, though, it's usually effective to throw the sword at maximum range. Worst case scenario, make sure there's a clone nearby for the sword to bounce off.

[ascii.1369]

3 hours ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

It's because if you're up close to an enemy and there's nobody else around, the projectile will bounce back to you (granting might), then to the enemy, and so on. It's the most effective way to use the skill to deal damage to a single target.

Unless you're spiking someone out of stealth in PvP, though, it's usually effective to throw the sword at maximum range. Worst case scenario, make sure there's a clone nearby for the sword to bounce off.

Yeah, I'm aware, but he is talking PvE if I'm not mistaken. Since everyone is stacking anyway there is no way to control who it bounces to. And if he wants to use it in open world it usually bounces between enemys or clones anyway.

[Jeyzer.1605]

On 7/13/2024 at 7:55 AM, ascii.1369 said:

The point of #5 is to push away enemies that come too close, it's not ment to be used in a damage rotation at range

The point I was making was that, for a self peeling skill, it's doing a poor job at it. If something is jumping at you, a small 450 pushback with a clear tell won't save you. Many classes got access to too much mobility over the years (Guardian, even Necro with Harbinger and recent weapons) so GS#5 feels comically irrelevant when it comes to keep your distances at the moment. 

On 7/13/2024 at 7:55 AM, ascii.1369 said:

And #2 has the same range as #1, #3 and #4, not sure what the reasoning is for calling it melee.

2/3 of GS#2 damage comes from the 3 extra bounces on a target. Those bounces only happen if you're melee or if there's 2 enemies stacked up (unreliable). If you use it at range without any bounce, it has less damage than a singular AA. Hence the reasoning for calling it melee, this skill is mostly only useful in melee. Would be fine, if it wasn't your #2 skill, the one on a low CD you should be spamming, and you ideally don't wanna stick to melee on GS. 

On 7/14/2024 at 2:02 PM, mirage.8046 said:

you knock them back to keep fighting said players at long range.

An easy to avoid wave that pushes back 450 won't let you keep fighting said players at long range though. 

On 7/15/2024 at 3:30 AM, Fueki.4753 said:

And Shatters are also melee????? Are we playing the same game?

They basically are? The core power Mesmer burst rotation is GS#2 -> Blink in MELEE -> F1 (in MELEE to have any semblance of damage) -> GS#3. Like sure you can cast it in range, but you'll lose half of the damage, so what's the point?

On 7/14/2024 at 4:03 PM, Sifu.9745 said:

And GS #5 is 450 range: hard to call it melee range.

450 is melee range though. Almost every melee weapon I can think of has a 450 - 600 range skill at least. "Ranged" starts at 900. Also, most traits that affect melee damage / resistance are in the 400-600 range. Ele Dagger #1 skill has 600 range on Water, and 400 range on Fire #1, #2 and Water #2. That's still considered melee.

On 7/15/2024 at 5:04 AM, draxynnic.3719 said:

make sure there's a clone nearby for the sword to bounce off.

Unfortunately, it doesn't bounce off phantasms, only clones (and not the one spawned by it). So on GS you'd have to summon the zerkers, and then throw GS#2 after they turn into clones. That's also unreliable because: 

• Clones can and will die in 1-2 hit of any AoE.
• They're pretty slow so won't stick to the enemy if he moves around.
• GS#2 is bugged and can sometimes bounce off your clones back and forth (since there's 2 of them) instead of the enemy, making you lose 2/3 of the skill damage randomly.

On 7/15/2024 at 8:56 AM, ascii.1369 said:

Yeah, I'm aware, but he is talking PvE if I'm not mistaken.

I'm only talking about WvW / sPvP. Couldn't care less about GS in PvE to be honest, especially since we're getting a new weapon (Spear) to replace it for power builds. GS will mostly only be relevant in PvE for Mirage tagging, where you're just spamming Split Surge / Mind Stab anyway. 

On 7/13/2024 at 6:00 PM, Lincolnbeard.1735 said:

Way to kill power mesmer and to mess up muscle memory.

Yeah the ability shuffling seems like a pretty unpopular opinion from the comments here, but I don't get how that's supposed to kill power Mesmer? The gist of my proposal is to trade off a mostly irrelevant knockback for a more consistent way to setup your burst without having to burn your only mobility skill (Blink), I don't understand what part of that nerfs power Mesmer.

Edited July 16 by Jeyzer.1605

[draxynnic.3719]

7 hours ago, Jeyzer.1605 said:

Unfortunately, it doesn't bounce off phantasms, only clones (and not the one spawned by it). So on GS you'd have to summon the zerkers, and then throw GS#2 after they turn into clones. That's also unreliable because: 

• Clones can and will die in 1-2 hit of any AoE.
• They're pretty slow so won't stick to the enemy if he moves around.
• GS#2 is bugged and can sometimes bounce off your clones back and forth (since there's 2 of them) instead of the enemy, making you lose 2/3 of the skill damage randomly.

 

And if there's literally anything else within the potential bounce range, you might not get the optimal "sword bounces between you and your opponent" behaviour at point blank anyway.

It's only "melee" when you're pulling off the classic power mes "gank from stealth" manoeuvre. And even then, you're not getting 2/3 of your damage from bounces as you claim (you might have missed that ArenaNet applied a damage reduction to the bounces some time ago). Under most circumstances, it's a perfectly functional 1200 range attack. And if you literally can't keep a single clone up, have no enemies near the target to bounce to, and no allies nearby outside of the stealth gank attempt scenario... then you have bigger problems.

[Fueki.4753]

9 hours ago, Jeyzer.1605 said:

They basically are? The core power Mesmer burst rotation is GS#2 -> Blink in MELEE -> F1 (in MELEE to have any semblance of damage) -> GS#3. Like sure you can cast it in range, but you'll lose half of the damage, so what's the point?

You might want to fix your quoting there. You didn't quote me, but part of something that I quoted.

Also, that is not the rotation. It's one possible way of playing Mesmer.

9 hours ago, Jeyzer.1605 said:

450 is melee range though.

It may be a short range, but it's not melee range. Melee range is 130.

[Lincolnbeard.1735]

10 hours ago, Jeyzer.1605 said:

 

Yeah the ability shuffling seems like a pretty unpopular opinion from the comments here, but I don't get how that's supposed to kill power Mesmer? The gist of my proposal is to trade off a mostly irrelevant knockback for a more consistent way to setup your burst without having to burn your only mobility skill (Blink), I don't understand what part of that nerfs power Mesmer.

You suggest to add 12sec CD to a crucial power mesmer skill - mirror blade.

Edited July 17 by Lincolnbeard.1735

[Salt Mode.3780]

You want to upgrade gs? make the 2nd skill bounce one less and increase the dmg on it. When they lowered the dmg and gave it an extra bounce it fcked it up so hard that till this day it is buggy.

[katte nici.9483]

Worth a try.

[zeyeti.8347]

Only skill who is not ranged is gs 5 , the rest is 1200 range , and the shatters make your clones go on the target and explode (only distorsion make them dissapear immediately) you just loose the damage from yourself acting like a clone for shatters. 

As many ppl said , neither i see any improvement , you just shuffle skill order for what ? mess up with muscle memory ? try it out on a power virtuoso and see how hard your phantasmal berserker hit , for skill 5 having yet another blink on a mesmer would make it an absolute nightmare in wvw and pvp and you just take down a good cc skill for another port in pve while we still have blink . 

If there is one weapon who need a complete overhaul for mesmer it's torch , and maybe pistol a bit (fine to me as it is now) , but torch is used for what ? some stealth in pvp and wvw , and that's all , the skills are old and the fact that none condi based weapons are used as condi weapon (on virtuoso) shows the lackluster skills for this weapon. it's focuesd on burn and confusion , burn is not a mesmer favored condi (nothing to improve the duration) and confusion... let's be real , is nerfed to the ground and deal even less base dmg than bleed...

But Gs doesn't need a rework , it's strong and the fact a greatsword who is supposed to be melee is actualy long ranged 1200 is weird but really funny.

Edited July 24 by zeyeti.8347

[draxynnic.3719]

17 minutes ago, zeyeti.8347 said:

If there is one weapon who need a complete overhaul for mesmer it's torch , and maybe pistol a bit (fine to me as it is now) , but torch is used for what ? some stealth in pvp and wvw , and that's all , the skills are old and the fact that none condi based weapons are used as condi weapon (on virtuoso) shows the lackluster skills for this weapon. it's focuesd on burn and confusion , burn is not a mesmer favored condi (nothing to improve the duration) and confusion... let's be real , is nerfed to the ground and deal even less base dmg than bleed...

Condition virtuoso is not really a good benchmark here because cvirt is a bit weird in that it's really more of a hybrid between power and bleed damage, and therefore favours phantasms with good power damage and that deal out lots of strikes (that convert into more bleeds through Sharper Images). You'd really be looking at condi chrono and mirage to properly judge it. Currently, chronos use torch, mirages don't. I'm not sure exactly what's going on with mirage to make them prefer pistol off the top of my head, but it's worth noting that when condition mirage isn't using staff, the second weaponset usually includes a torch.

[zeyeti.8347]

On 7/24/2024 at 6:38 PM, draxynnic.3719 said:

Condition virtuoso is not really a good benchmark here because cvirt is a bit weird in that it's really more of a hybrid between power and bleed damage, and therefore favours phantasms with good power damage and that deal out lots of strikes (that convert into more bleeds through Sharper Images). You'd really be looking at condi chrono and mirage to properly judge it. Currently, chronos use torch, mirages don't. I'm not sure exactly what's going on with mirage to make them prefer pistol off the top of my head, but it's worth noting that when condition mirage isn't using staff, the second weaponset usually includes a torch.

chrono use torch because it's the only off hand condi weapon with pistol based (which is even more power oriented than condi , skill 4 doing great p. damage and skill 5 very underwhelming condi dmg) torch is the only full condi based off hand mesmer has (and it is weak), it also has weird condi to apply (burn and confusion) who are not favored condition , burn being a good condition but too weak in numbers for mesmer to invest into it (in condi duration) and we all know confusion is dog*** damage since nerf. 

since there is virtuoso and don't see any good reason (stealth only...) to use torch.

[draxynnic.3719]

Guess you know the game better than Snowcrows, then! /s

If you only consider virt, then every mesmer condi weapon is bad, since staff and scepter partially rely on clones. But virt isn't the only mesmer specialisation, and it certainly can't generate quickness or alacrity. Just because virtuoso is probably the best 'hi dps' build does not mean that every weapon should be judged according to whether it works with virt.

[Jobber.6348]

Why call it improvement when it's all nerfs. Mirror Blade is also fine because Mesmers who want to power burst are forced or encouraged to burn a gap closer/Stealth for it, which is a fine risk for reward. There's nothing wrong with it period.

Also, all of these are so telegraphed that a good player who has ears just hears the spawning sound for Berserkers and instantly dodge and negate the entire burst. There's nothing to improve here, the weapon's decent and does its job well as well as performs well in what it's designed to do, which is deal ranged power damage. 

If there's one thing that absolutely needs to be improved, it's probably the after cast of Mind Stab being essentially a mini-root which can be self-interrupted to cancel the skill, which happens way more often than I would like. 

[Jeyzer.1605]

On 7/17/2024 at 4:07 AM, Lincolnbeard.1735 said:

You suggest to add 12sec CD to a crucial power mesmer skill - mirror blade.

It may be a crucial power mesmer skill, but it's extremely unreliable, so is it really that crucial?

On 7/24/2024 at 12:14 PM, zeyeti.8347 said:

you just take down a good cc skill for another port in pve while we still have blink . 

Disagree on the good cc skill, how is a measly 450 knockback on a 25s CD going to be useful against any melee spec? Nowadays they can pretty much all stick to you the whole time. Even if we don't get mobility, a stun/knockdown would be more useful to setup your GS#2 or zerkers. 

 

On 7/24/2024 at 12:14 PM, zeyeti.8347 said:

confusion... let's be real , is nerfed to the ground and deal even less base dmg than bleed...

In PvE sure, but in WvW confusion is pretty potent. 

 

On 7/24/2024 at 12:38 PM, draxynnic.3719 said:

. Currently, chronos use torch, mirages don't. I'm not sure exactly what's going on with mirage to make them prefer pistol off the top of my head,

Not familiar with condi chrono but I imagine the condi burst of traited torch is higher on them because of Continuum Split. 

Mirage do use torch in PvP / WvW though. Some take it on power builds for the stealth + cleanse, and most condi mirage builds will use Dagger Pistol + Sword Torch or Axe Torch / Pistol + Staff or Sword Pistol / Torch.

Torch is used for condi builds for the same reasons are for power (stealth + cleanse), as well as the added daze for interrupt and burning + confusion burst. So mostly as a swap weapon. Pistol is preferred because of the perma bleed from Duelist's Discipline and the quick recharges from the multiple dagger ambushes.

On 7/27/2024 at 12:16 AM, Jobber.6348 said:

Mirror Blade is also fine because Mesmers who want to power burst are forced or encouraged to burn a gap closer/Stealth for it, which is a fine risk for reward.

As far as I'm aware, no other power burst class is forced to burn their only escape to burst down anyone. Not sure why this risk reward is present for power Mesmers but no other classes. My main point is that if a class is designed to deliver their burst in melee range, which Mesmer is due to the nature of shatters + their main power burst weapon GS, then they must come with a dedicated gap closer. I don't see how being forced to rely on a utility skill that also happens to be your only mobility / escape tool is fair. 

 

On 7/27/2024 at 12:16 AM, Jobber.6348 said:

Also, all of these are so telegraphed that a good player who has ears just hears the spawning sound for Berserkers and instantly dodge and negate the entire burst.

Exactly, since everything is so telegraphed, then why do we have the extra punishment's of being this high risk? There's already enough counterplay as is so it's not like the build is overperforming against any decent player.

[Jobber.6348]

2 hours ago, Jeyzer.1605 said:

It may be a crucial power mesmer skill, but it's extremely unreliable, so is it really that crucial?

Disagree on the good cc skill, how is a measly 450 knockback on a 25s CD going to be useful against any melee spec? Nowadays they can pretty much all stick to you the whole time. Even if we don't get mobility, a stun/knockdown would be more useful to setup your GS#2 or zerkers. 

 

In PvE sure, but in WvW confusion is pretty potent. 

 

Not familiar with condi chrono but I imagine the condi burst of traited torch is higher on them because of Continuum Split. 

Mirage do use torch in PvP / WvW though. Some take it on power builds for the stealth + cleanse, and most condi mirage builds will use Dagger Pistol + Sword Torch or Axe Torch / Pistol + Staff or Sword Pistol / Torch.

Torch is used for condi builds for the same reasons are for power (stealth + cleanse), as well as the added daze for interrupt and burning + confusion burst. So mostly as a swap weapon. Pistol is preferred because of the perma bleed from Duelist's Discipline and the quick recharges from the multiple dagger ambushes.

As far as I'm aware, no other power burst class is forced to burn their only escape to burst down anyone. Not sure why this risk reward is present for power Mesmers but no other classes. My main point is that if a class is designed to deliver their burst in melee range, which Mesmer is due to the nature of shatters + their main power burst weapon GS, then they must come with a dedicated gap closer. I don't see how being forced to rely on a utility skill that also happens to be your only mobility / escape tool is fair. 

 

Exactly, since everything is so telegraphed, then why do we have the extra punishment's of being this high risk? There's already enough counterplay as is so it's not like the build is overperforming against any decent player.

And the solution is to turn a Ranged Power Burst weapon design into... a sustained damage sieging weapon? That's not going to help either because people can now ignore Mesmer's Greatsword since the damage output is now low but sustained. 

Mesmers are not known for being durable enough to play a sustained damage Power playstyle, they have Condition builds for that. You turn GS into a weaker sustained damage playstyle and Power Mesmer in competitive will crumble at its roots, being unable to burst anyone down as they repeatedly disengage and heal up before reengaging the mesmer. 

[Exciton.8942]

I don't really see much problem with current mirror blade. It does okay damage in range. It does big burst in melee and can combo for bigger burst with shatter.

Only thing I want is they swap back boon rip to GS3. Right now GS3 is complete filler skill with no purpose.