Shattering the Status Quo

[Relair.1843]

I hate this, I don't want 2 second clones that explode, I wanted tricky phantasms that would keep living indefinitely and providing benefits. Thanks for ruining the class just because you were too lazy to redesign shatters instead.

[Deyneris.5216]

My earlier post was deleted by the devs, considered too rude and insulting to anet’s staff. I won’t repeat my sentiments, but I most certainly stand by them.I think it’s important to talk about the purpose (supposed) of the changes made to Mesmer and the actual outcome.

The professed (and I do mean this in the pretense sense of the definition) purpose was to make game play more interesting and active, to force (not encourage or entice) the use of a crappy profession mechanic (shatter). Note they didn’t do ANYTHING to the shatter mechanic that they are shoving down our throats. It’s still as craptastic as ever.So have there been any bennies from the changes made to phantasm? Only one that I’ve noticed in my game play – the GS phantasms (with Imagined Burden and Chronophantasma) do more damage.

BUT I feel compelled to list all the things I USED to do as an active mesmer and what I’ve had to replace those activities with.I used to toss out my phantasm and let it do its thing, while I would help other players that had been downed in group fightsNow I get to micro manage useless clones.I used to toss out my phantasms so they could distract beasties, while I would slip by unnoticed.Now I get to micro manage useless clones.I used to frequently be the last one standing in a dungeon party, using my phantasm to keep agro while I dodged and whittled down the boss – just me and my phantasmNow I get to micro manage useless clones.I used to be able to travel through elite areas alone and If I found someone in trouble (downed or dead) I could toss out a phantasm that would keep agro while I helped them up.Now I get to micro manage useless clones.I used to shatter strategically (I’m looking at you Three-toed Tootsie)Now I get to micro manage useless clones.So time to look at the actual outcome of these tragic, ill-conceived, worthless mal-adaptations: while the extra damage is nice, y’all utterly failed in your professed purpose. I am a less active player, I am a less helpful player, I am a less interested player. I am sad and grieving over something I have enjoyed for YEARS and now just puts a knot in my stomach when I think about logging on.Rest assured, I am not alone (nor is the above complaint exhaustive—tip of the iceberg, really) in thinking these changes suck.

putitback

[Boreas The North.1892]

Not really my cup of tea, guess I will focus on another class now.

[Snaetch.8612]

Mesmer has kept myself and many others so engaged for years... why make these changes now? I'm extremely disappointed. The class performs worse, feels worse...

Why?

[moutzaheadin.4029]

@"Snaetch.8612" said:Mesmer has kept myself and many others so engaged for years... why make these changes now? I'm extremely disappointed. The class performs worse, feels worse...

Why?

It's pretty simple , Anet wanted to get rid of a bunch of specs that people constantly complained about.

What better way to nerf 3-4 specs then to redesign the class mechanics all at once ?

Add in the confusion nerf and call it "fix'd"

The real problem is Anet has been doing this a long time. So they know they needed to buff some specs within the profession to keep the forum rage level to a controllable minority.

So now power mirage is basically there to pacify the white knights and praise the redesign job.

My favorite part of it all is now that everyone plays the same mirage spec the forums are lighting up with "omgawd da one shot mezmur got me"..

How long before that's gone ? My guess is very soon.

Mesmer R.i.p 2018.

Thanks Robert gee. Your part of the reason gw2 is a laughing stock of competitive pvp game play. You couldn't balance the front tire on a big wheel.

[Oriens.5630]

@Lanhelin.3480 said:

The Defender taunts? - And then becomes a clone and gets instantly destroyed, so what's the point of the taunt? This would only make sense if the clone gets some sort of Phantasm-Echo-Buff, like Invulnerability.

I'd like to see a response to this question myself.

[Magicienne Endormie.5182]

Those changes just ruined my mesmer. She wasn't a overkill character, she didn't do much damage since I don't have crazy equipment yet and didn't give her a specialization, but she was fun to play, reliable, and durable. She was just a simple mesmer. She was one of my first characters, and one of my favorites, and the main one I played the story with. I played her using the phantasmal warden, defender and disenchanter. She's now completely useless and dies in a second.Those changes are awful, and what is the most awful in it is how Anet took away from us our choice. It is unacceptable to force "active" playing on us. Some people like playing "active", some prefer "passive", how is that a bad thing? I have health issues and rely on simple patterns. Forcing me to "active" playing is violent, and most importantly I just can't adapt to this. It's not fun to me, and it's simply not possible to me either, I can't adapt to such a change. Congratulations Anet, you've gone from a game that offered us a large variety of gameplays to a discriminatory game that excludes people with health issues.I don't understand this choice. I had already noticed how many more "active" features there were in HoT and PoF; the timed adventures being one of them. But you gave us the choice of doing those adventures or not. Some of them I do and have fun with. Others I can't do at all, but I didn't mind. It wasn't crucial to the game. The timed hero challenges were annoying too, but doable as long as we grouped up. Trying to make everything "active", timed, is not a good evolution, but is okay as long as we have the choice. Here, you're taking the choice away from us. I bought this game. I bought the expansions. I buy gems from time to time, too. But I bought them because I approved of what I had tested in the demo. Changing this, taking the choice away from us, forcing us to go from "passive" to "active" playing, is making you a liar about the product you advertised. This is NOT the game I bought.What's next? What profession are you going to ruin next? Surely you aren't going to stop here? Surely you're gonna take each profession one by one and destroy everything that seems too "passive" to you?Please give us back our previous phantasms. Please.And please stop discriminating against people with health issues. Respect our choices of playing "actively" or "passively". GW2 wouldn't have thrived if those two gameplays were not compatible.

Is there any point at all to talk here in the forum? Do Anet even have a look at it? I am seriously depressed about this.

[Ironhand.9081]

@"Magicienne Endormie.5182" said:Is there any point at all to talk here in the forum? Do Anet even have a look at it? I am seriously depressed about this.

Oh they look at it. It just doesn't make any difference what a few people says; they already know that for whatever change they make, there's always someone who's going to be unhappy about it.

What's distrubing is that the changes are bad and the reason given "passive play" isn't valid. Or if it ever was, there's worse offenders. I've had some time trying out the new setup, and well, shattering is still too weak to be useful as a damage mechanic, nevermind that they left all the now worthless phantasm traits in. Diversion is ok as a D-bar breaker, but other than that you're better off not shattering other than as a finisher and barely even that. The only good mechanic introduced was the non-shattering of phantasms so you don't have to choose between clones or phantasms, but it's not like that matters anymore when they'll disappear at first attack. It's definitely making an already weak class weaker for the sake of a few whiners. You'd think they would have learned back in the original game that you shouldn't ever mix pvp and pve balance.

[CrMorata.7498]

After a while playing. I can better evaluate the changes of the Mesmer.

PVE- The changes were good, a reduction of damage, but nothing to disrupt.

PVP- I do not think it's good. For the mirage can no longer play closely and the reduction of confusion appears in the fall of the damage.

WVW- As in PVP, a good drop in damage was felt up close.

Conclusions:The initial Phantasm damage was good.A new way of playing needs to be trained.The balancing was not very favorable overall.Phantasms have gained initial damage, but are more fragile than clones.The main condition damage of the class: the confusion, is no longer the most powerful, characterizing the class a little.The Phantasmal Force, as it is, loses its stakes role, since it depended on the life of the ghosts.

Proposals:Eliminate ghosts by first clones that do the same function.Review confusion, which is the characteristic of the class.Look at the Chrono, because it got lost in the changes.The Mirage return to play in the media / long distance in PVP and WVW.Change the Phantasmal Force.

It's my main class and I really enjoy playing with it.I liked the changes, but they lack details.

[Theocraft.6053]

great changes!

I'd started playing as a mesmer a long time ago but quickly felt that it is boring? badly designed? class and moreover - weak in PvE (don't like sheer support and have time only for PvE)

Currently the mesmer is very fun in use and has enjoyable damage. I've started a new mesmer, again and I feel this is my new main :)But it is because it feels different and this may be also the reason for old mesmer players to feel annoyed because they liked what was earlier. What for me was boring and bland gameplay, for them may had been convenient and stable.

[Deyneris.5216]

Dear Devs, I'm begging you PLEASE put mesmer back. PLEASE, please, please! I miss playing my mesmer. I can play other toons/professions but I don't have the affinity for them I had for my mesmer. Please put it back. Please. Yes, this is me begging.

[Daviot.7124]

Dear ANet,Really disappointed in the change to my favorite class. My favorite build was a sword+pistol/greatsword combination that used phantasms and shattering, and with phantasms (including those from pistol and greatsword) now delivering just one attack, it severely hampers my fun in playing through the PvE story. :<

[Deyneris.5216]

I cannot seem to let this go. Please give me my mesmer back. Playing this way sucks, which leaves me with not playing my favorite character. Begging still. Give me my mesmer back!

[Voltekka.2375]

@Deyneris.5216 said:I cannot seem to let this go. Please give me my mesmer back. Playing this way sucks, which leaves me with not playing my favorite character. Begging still. Give me my mesmer back!

The most broken class in this game, right now. Pvp is a mess cause of it. It can do pretty much everything in pve (utilities, dps, you name it). Broken in wvw small scale, really valuable in zergs with boonsharing and boonspamming. This class needs a huge overhaul. And a nerf.

[Magek.4718]

Ugh, haven't played my mesmer in a while so I was unaware of this change for a long time.

Maybe I'm biased because I am a phantasm build but this was an awful change. I do not enjoy being forced into Shatter AT ALL. Now I have to basically relearn my entire class because my playstyle is no longer suited for it.

Not to mention, reconfigure my entire build since a whole bunch of my traits don't do what I want them to do anymore. What a pain.

The best feedback I can give is to restore phantasms to their previous state because honestly, I feel pretty worthless and weak now that my damage in is the gutter. Removing playstyle options for classes is NOT the way to go at all. Again, this change was GARBAGE.

[Deyneris.5216]

I'm still upset about this. You need to restore mesmer phantasms...why is it that every other profession with persistent aid is okay but not mesmer? Rangers have their pets. Engineers have their turrets and rocket launchers, necros have their minions. Guardian spirit weapons aren't persistent but NOBODY uses them at higher levels. Can you imagine if a engineer turrets did 1 or 2 shots and then exploded? OR a Ranger pet did 2 attacks and then went and chased and ambient rabbit for the rest of the encounter? Y'all need to fix this. Still, begging. Give me back my mesmer.

[Magicienne Endormie.5182]

So, some time has passed and I've been playing my mesmer for a while, have been playing the plot with her since I can't just change my main character like that. I still haven't given her either the chronomancer neither the mirage specialization. I still don't want to, because those don't fit her at all (I had plans for two more characters I would play with those specializations, but by now I'm so bitter that I don't feel like playing those at all).I tried to adapt without my phantasms. Oh, I can play. But the thing is: it's not fun anymore and it's often very frustrating and stressful. She's still awfully weak, so in high-level maps I cannot play her solo.

@Deyneris.5216 said:I'm still upset about this. You need to restore mesmer phantasms...why is it that every other profession with persistent aid is okay but not mesmer? Rangers have their pets. Engineers have their turrets and rocket launchers, necros have their minions. Guardian spirit weapons aren't persistent but NOBODY uses them at higher levels. Can you imagine if a engineer turrets did 1 or 2 shots and then exploded? OR a Ranger pet did 2 attacks and then went and chased and ambient rabbit for the rest of the encounter? Y'all need to fix this. Still, begging. Give me back my mesmer.I agree with Deyneris, and I'm still upset too. The change isn't necessarily all bad, but it is just not fit to everybody's way of playing. It shouldn't have been a core change. I've seen many people playing their mesmers awesomely. But I've seen a lot of people simply giving up their mesmer because they couldn't anymore. I don't understand why it would be so hard to simply give us the choice??? Why not simply make it a trait? We should be able to choose whether we want to keep our phantasms around or transform them into clones. A simple trait would do it.Please give us our phantasms back. I miss having my special phantasms around me. I loved knowing they had each their special skills and weapons. I loved having to keep an eye on them and make sure I wasn't missing one. Now all I have is the same clones. I don't even look at them anymore. It's dull, and sad.