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Can the elite weapon on the new specs not be *THE BEST* per se?


Firebeard.1746

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I'm kinda miffed I can't use GS effectively in raids/strikes/fractals as mirage, I like the ambush skill for GS, but the throughput is just ineffective. Almost all of the extra damage from the spec come from imaginary axes and the trait that gives additional ones on axe skill use. (To be fair, its autoattack also has ridiculously heavy condi damage as well, far and above anything the other mirage weapons could generate, either on plain auto attacks OR ambushes. )

I prefer choice, and I feel like making the elite weapon THE choice kills the spec sometimes and makes the elite specs feel more like pigeonholing than an actual extension of your class. I'd say good traits are ones like Chronophantasma that work well with ALL weapons and not just one.

I'm not saying make the elite weapons bad, I'm just saying it feels bad when there's only 1 weapon choice for an elite.

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@Firebeard.1746 said:I'm kinda miffed I can't use GS effectively in raids/strikes/fractals as mirage, I like the ambush skill for GS, but the throughput is just ineffective. Almost all of the extra damage from the spec come from imaginary axes and the trait that gives additional ones on axe skill use. (To be fair, its autoattack also has ridiculously heavy condi damage as well, far and above anything the other mirage weapons could generate, either on plain auto attacks OR ambushes. )

I prefer choice, and I feel like making the elite weapon THE choice kills the spec sometimes and makes the elite specs feel more like pigeonholing than an actual extension of your class. I'd say good traits are ones like Chronophantasma that work well with ALL weapons and not just one.

I'm not saying make the elite weapons bad, I'm just saying it feels bad when there's only 1 weapon choice for an elite.

I think GS, from what you said, just isn't the right weapon for that specialization. I'm sure other weapons would work besides Axe, but this seems that Mirage it's meant for that one weapon.

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Broadly speaking, mirage greatsword wasn't really intended for boss fights in general, since the point of the ambush skill is to split damage across multiple targets (and targets between you and those targets, and all the targets your clones can hit). It really shines for fighting groups. Greatsword mesmers going into boss fights usually run chrono instead.

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@Firebeard.1746 said:I'm kinda miffed I can't use GS effectively in raids/strikes/fractals as mirage, I like the ambush skill for GS, but the throughput is just ineffective. Almost all of the extra damage from the spec come from imaginary axes and the trait that gives additional ones on axe skill use. (To be fair, its autoattack also has ridiculously heavy condi damage as well, far and above anything the other mirage weapons could generate, either on plain auto attacks OR ambushes. )

I prefer choice, and I feel like making the elite weapon THE choice kills the spec sometimes and makes the elite specs feel more like pigeonholing than an actual extension of your class. I'd say good traits are ones like Chronophantasma that work well with ALL weapons and not just one.

I'm not saying make the elite weapons bad, I'm just saying it feels bad when there's only 1 weapon choice for an elite.

The Weapons on elite specs are designed to fit the play style that the elite specs are after. So they are a part of the package so it'd make sense they'd usually be better. This isn't always the case as Pistol/Pistol condi holosmith is fairly popular and a lot of high end raiding Chronomancer builds have dropped the shield. It looks like the ambush skill wasn't designed for those game modes. More open world. Not that greatsword is useless in raids, I've used it before on ranged strats. Like others have said, just doesn't seem to be the right weapon for mirage.

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Some weapons that come with elite spec are good, but other are far from being "the best" (I'm thinking about DH longbow or Soulbeast daggers for example). So, to answer the title: "Yes, e-spec weapons can not be the best "per se". They may have synergy with the e-spec but are not necessarily the absolute best option."

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@Fueki.4753 said:The elite specialization's weapons aren't always the best for it.Sometimes they aren't even a good choice.

Dragonhunter's Longbow, for example, is not even close to be good.I nearly never use Shield on Herald or Warhorn on Tempest.

All the raid builds for tempest I've seen use warhorn.

@VocalThought.9835 said:

@Firebeard.1746 said:I'm kinda miffed I can't use GS effectively in raids/strikes/fractals as mirage, I like the ambush skill for GS, but the throughput is just ineffective. Almost all of the extra damage from the spec come from imaginary axes and the trait that gives additional ones on axe skill use. (To be fair, its autoattack also has ridiculously heavy condi damage as well, far and above anything the other mirage weapons could generate, either on plain auto attacks OR ambushes. )

I prefer choice, and I feel like making the elite weapon
THE
choice kills the spec sometimes and makes the elite specs feel more like pigeonholing than an actual extension of your class. I'd say good traits are ones like Chronophantasma that work well with
ALL
weapons and not just one.

I'm not saying make the elite weapons bad, I'm just saying it feels bad when there's only 1 weapon choice for an elite.

I think GS, from what you said, just isn't the right weapon for that specialization. I'm sure other weapons would work besides Axe, but this seems that Mirage it's meant for that one weapon.

I'm pretty sure you can't get good DPS on anything but Axe for mirage. Mesmer's strongest main weapon (sword) has a ambush attack with an animation that takes way too long (and the ambush attacks for almost all the weapons have really long animations). And as i've stated earlier, the DPS builds for mirage that actually work focus on those imaginary axes for a non-trivial amount of DPS, which are only generated from axe attacks.

I get what alot of you are saying, that it's not always the best, I've mentioned the special case of chrono as well, i'm saying I want more e-specs like chrono than like Mirage.

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Not all classes are optimal with elite weapons, especially for pve.

DH, does not use LB.Warrior uses axe/axe mostly all across, except for condi berserker.Power rev uses S/S. Both elites.Eng has flexibility.Soul beats uses GS and axe/axe. Actually, I do not think daggers see much play anywhere.Chrono uses sword/sword. Support still uses the shield though.

It is not bad. I more concerned with weapons that absolutely suck in pve.

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@otto.5684 said:Not all classes are optimal with elite weapons, especially for pve.

DH, does not use LB.Warrior uses axe/axe mostly all across, except for condi berserker.Power rev uses S/S. Both elites.Eng has flexibility.Soul beats uses GS and axe/axe. Actually, I do not think daggers see much play anywhere.Chrono uses sword/sword. Support still uses the shield though.

It is not bad. I more concerned with weapons that absolutely suck in pve.

To be fair, spellbreakers often do use daggers, especially in PvP, there are some power and condi renegade builds that primarily use shortbow, and soulbeast dagger is fairly popular on condi soulbeasts nowadays. None of these are cases of being clearly optimal, though, just good with specific builds.

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@draxynnic.3719 said:

@otto.5684 said:Not all classes are optimal with elite weapons, especially for pve.

DH, does not use LB.Warrior uses axe/axe mostly all across, except for condi berserker.Power rev uses S/S. Both elites.Eng has flexibility.Soul beats uses GS and axe/axe. Actually, I do not think daggers see much play anywhere.Chrono uses sword/sword. Support still uses the shield though.

It is not bad. I more concerned with weapons that absolutely suck in pve.

To be fair, spellbreakers often do use daggers, especially in PvP, there are some power and condi renegade builds that primarily use shortbow, and soulbeast dagger is fairly popular on condi soulbeasts nowadays. None of these are cases of being clearly optimal, though, just good with specific builds.

And that is good. Not that I think that a specific elite weapon being optimal with most of a that elite builds is a bad thing. It is not a persuasive issue like the OP made it.

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@Firebeard.1746 said:All the raid builds for tempest I've seen use warhorn.And all Tempest raiding build's I'm aware of are variants of Aura sharing and transmuting builds.My Open World Tempests, however, use Dual Daggers and don't rely on anything Aura-related.My Tempests certainly are not as optimal for DPS as raid Tempests are for support, but they still fulfil their role efficiently.

This just shows that Warhorn is not the the best weapon for Tempests per se (which, in this case, would mean on any build in any situation).

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@otto.5684 said:

@otto.5684 said:Not all classes are optimal with elite weapons, especially for pve.

DH, does not use LB.Warrior uses axe/axe mostly all across, except for condi berserker.Power rev uses S/S. Both elites.Eng has flexibility.Soul beats uses GS and axe/axe. Actually, I do not think daggers see much play anywhere.Chrono uses sword/sword. Support still uses the shield though.

It is not bad. I more concerned with weapons that absolutely suck in pve.

To be fair, spellbreakers often do use daggers, especially in PvP, there are some power and condi renegade builds that primarily use shortbow, and soulbeast dagger is fairly popular on condi soulbeasts nowadays. None of these are cases of being clearly optimal, though, just good with specific builds.

And that is good. Not that I think that a specific elite weapon being optimal with most of a that elite builds is a bad thing. It is not a persuasive issue like the OP made it.

Which is pretty much what I was thinking when I came into the thread, before I actually read the OP. Despite the title coming across as fairly expansive, the OP does seem pretty focused on mirage. Where... it's kinda hard to say that mirage axe isn't the best weapon they have, at least for condi builds.

On the other hand, though, that's largely because mirage axe is the only melee condi weapon that mesmer has, and melee weapons are generally expected to have either higher DPS or better defensive qualities than ranged weapons. Power mirage also doesn't work very well in boss fights, since the sword and greatsword ambush skills are oriented more towards control or area damage respectively than maximising DPS against a single target. Scepter could possibly work, but that's a hybrid weapon to begin with.

Mind you, this is primarily an instanced PvP issue, which largely makes it a boss fight issue. Something has to be the best DPS weapon for boss fights, and it makes sense for axe to be mirage's best weapon under those circumstances for the reasons outlined above.

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@Firebeard.1746 said:I'm kinda miffed I can't use GS effectively in raids/strikes/fractals as mirage, I like the ambush skill for GS, but the throughput is just ineffective. Almost all of the extra damage from the spec come from imaginary axes and the trait that gives additional ones on axe skill use. (To be fair, its autoattack also has ridiculously heavy condi damage as well, far and above anything the other mirage weapons could generate, either on plain auto attacks OR ambushes. )

I prefer choice, and I feel like making the elite weapon THE choice kills the spec sometimes and makes the elite specs feel more like pigeonholing than an actual extension of your class. I'd say good traits are ones like Chronophantasma that work well with ALL weapons and not just one.

I'm not saying make the elite weapons bad, I'm just saying it feels bad when there's only 1 weapon choice for an elite.

Condi Soulbeast is still going to be more powerful with a shortbow in pve.Power DPS Chronomancer will not use a shield.Wasn't the meta for Condi Berserker actually the longbow and not the offhand torch?Doesn't Spellbreaker do much higher damage with a greatsword instead of dagger/dagger?Isn't staff Weaver still a thing?Isn't the Scrapper meta for WvW pistol/shield?Is there a decent Dragonhunter out there who still uses the Longbow other than a few niche sPvP builds?

The main reason GS isn't as effective as axe on Mirage is because it's a power weapon and Mirage is a condi spec. Axe was designed as a condi weapon. It may not suit your personal class fantasy but it's got little to do with axe being overpowered compared to the alternatives. It's the fact that its a proper condi weapon on a class without many alternatives when using a condi spec.

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@Fueki.4753 said:

@Firebeard.1746 said:All the raid builds for tempest I've seen use warhorn.And all Tempest raiding build's I'm aware of are variants of Aura sharing and transmuting builds.My Open World Tempests, however, use Dual Daggers and don't rely on anything Aura-related.My Tempests certainly are not as optimal for DPS as
raid Tempests are for support
, but they still fulfil their role efficiently.

This just shows that Warhorn is not the the best weapon for Tempests
per se
(which, in this case, would mean on any build in any situation).Condi tempest is absolutely viable in raids where bosses are better suited for condi and uses warhorn.Tempest is absolutely top tier support but is viable DPS both condi and power/fresh air.Open world tempest is much more effective both condi and power using warhorn than offhand dagger. The offhand dagger can't offer the damage that WH does.

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@"Fueki.4753" said:The elite specialization's weapons aren't always the best for it.Sometimes they aren't even a good choice.

Dragonhunter's Longbow, for example, is not even close to be good.I nearly never use Shield on Herald or Warhorn on Tempest.

Herald Shield could be good if the trait were folded into the base skills (shield skills cleanse conditions, have lower cooldowns), and Hardening Persistence gets buffed to "-2% damage per point of upkeep, -4% for 5 seconds after a shield skill is used."

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Sorry but dude, if you wanna play power gs on mesmer, just play chrono.Elite specs are designed to get a new weapon, it's only natural, that this elite specs plays around with this weapon then. (Even though there are some exceptions)Would you like to get a new weapon, that has absolutely no synergies with the traits or the new play style the espec is supposed to bring up? @Firebeard.1746

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scope of OP is mainly (high end) pve so ill mention only (high end) pve

its an unavoidable ‘problem’ if base weapons do not coincidentally (and properly) cover all niches by themselves.

e.g.why would you not want to use staff on daredevil? other power options are garbage in comparisonwhy would you not want to use gs on reaper? other power options are garbagetorch... scg? other OHs are garbagewh... temp? other OHs are garbageaxe... mirage? other condi MHs are garbage

thief, necro and ele imo have depressing core weapon choices that they are almost guaranteed to ditch in favour for any new weapon that comes with espec (tho d/d on DE appears to be passable... /shrug)

unless you have strong pre existing options like warr, guard, rev, ranger, or kits from engi, this problem will exist. core supp options and condi OHs are kind of lacking across all specs tho, so stuff still happens there

try making a wep that completely surpasses a/a for power warr, MH sword/lb for condi (sword is pretty garbo now when i look at it)try making a wep that completely surpasses guard’s plethora of well designed wepss/s for power rev, MH mace for condigs x/a for power ranger, sb for condikits in general for engi in generalmeanwhile its super easy for thief, necro and ele

mesmer has a strong core power kit, but its condi kit is lacking and hence why axe is simply superior on a condi pigeonholed spec like mirage (scepter/staff are not even on any of the wep swaps)

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@Fueki.4753 said:

@Firebeard.1746 said:All the raid builds for tempest I've seen use warhorn.And all Tempest raiding build's I'm aware of are variants of Aura sharing and transmuting builds.My Open World Tempests, however, use Dual Daggers and don't rely on anything Aura-related.My Tempests certainly are not as optimal for DPS as raid Tempests are for support, but they still fulfil their role efficiently.

This just shows that Warhorn is not the the best weapon for Tempests
per se
(which, in this case, would mean on any build in any situation).

Wh is far stronger than d offhand. Air 5 is the only reason why tempest has good dmg in pve. It has nothing to do with aura traits.Holo doesnt use sword in all builds because it lacks an offhand. Some weapons fill a niche like chrono shield. But elite weapons that are not best for the elite in any gamemode are just badly designed or underpowered.What place does a new weapon have when it is not better than an already existing one.

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@mindcircus.1506 said:

@Firebeard.1746 said:I'm kinda miffed I can't use GS effectively in raids/strikes/fractals as mirage, I like the ambush skill for GS, but the throughput is just ineffective. Almost all of the extra damage from the spec come from imaginary axes and the trait that gives additional ones on axe skill use. (To be fair, its autoattack also has ridiculously heavy condi damage as well, far and above anything the other mirage weapons could generate, either on plain auto attacks OR ambushes. )

I prefer choice, and I feel like making the elite weapon
THE
choice kills the spec sometimes and makes the elite specs feel more like pigeonholing than an actual extension of your class. I'd say good traits are ones like Chronophantasma that work well with
ALL
weapons and not just one.

I'm not saying make the elite weapons bad, I'm just saying it feels bad when there's only 1 weapon choice for an elite.

Condi Soulbeast is still going to be more powerful with a shortbow in pve.Condi soulbeast has multiple builds. The highest dps one doesnt use shortbow. All use dagger.Wasn't the meta for Condi Berserker actually the longbow and not the offhand torch?What if i told you that you can weapon swap in combat.Doesn't Spellbreaker do much higher damage with a greatsword instead of dagger/dagger?No. Multiple builds exist but you can still swap weapons in combat.Isn't staff Weaver still a thing?Maybe in wvsw zergs.Isn't the Scrapper meta for WvW pistol/shield?For support. Hammer is the best weapon power engi has. Holo with hammer would be insane.

The main reason GS isn't as effective as axe on Mirage is because it's a power weapon and Mirage is a condi spec. Axe was designed as a condi weapon. It may not suit your personal class fantasy but it's got little to do with axe being overpowered compared to the alternatives. It's the fact that its a proper condi weapon on a class without many alternatives when using a condi spec.

Traits like chronophantasma are also just bad. Thats a 25-30% power mod which results in chrono being mandatory for power mesmer builds in pve. Part of gs mirage being bad is chrono having ridiculous modifiers.You cant use power mirage in raids because the mirage line has 0 mods compared to chrono. The ambush would have to do ridiculous amounts of dmg to be worth as much as danger time + chronophantasma.

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@Dadnir.5038 said:

@"Noodle Ant.1605" said:axe... mirage? other condi MHs are garbage

I like scepter a lot on mesmer, it's pretty decent for condition damage. I understand that not everybody share my opinion on this weapon but calling it "garbage" feel incorrect.

remembering that i am commenting within the scope of (high-end) pve, i remember attempting to discuss core condi mes in pve with leonidrex and we came to the conclusion that doesnt work because one of the reasons is that scepter/staff cannot carry it into viability

condi chrono is basically carried by rewinder

condi mirage is quite literally a core mesmer with ambushes and axe, why is that axe is always chosen over scepter? scepter skills might look ok but the clones yuck, its so bad you cant even pull it out as your 2nd set. why play scepter if its like OP playing power gs on mirage, surely if it was good it would see more use

similarly thief, necro and ele core weapons are not totally garbage, but they turn out to be anyway because they will almost always get replaced

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@Noodle Ant.1605 said:

@Noodle Ant.1605 said:axe... mirage? other condi MHs are garbage

I like scepter a lot on mesmer, it's pretty decent for condition damage. I understand that not everybody share my opinion on this weapon but calling it "garbage" feel incorrect.

remembering that i am commenting within the scope of (high-end) pve, i remember attempting to discuss core condi mes in pve with leonidrex and we came to the conclusion that doesnt work because one of the reasons is that scepter/staff cannot carry it into viability

Well, I'm not into raid but I'm doing fractals just fine with condi scepter. I've had people criticizing me for using scepter instead of a more "meta" weapon, yet I hold my own way better than the people that criticized me for that. I stand on my position that saying scepter is garbage isn't an accurate statement, personnally I see results that prove to be more than good enough with it. It might deal slightly less damage overall than axe but it's not to the point of being labelled as "garbage", if it is then axe is "trash can" damage (which would just mean, as fals as it can be, that whatever weapon you use on mesmer, don't play condi).

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@Dadnir.5038 said:ppl say condi is ‘bad’ in fracs (exclu 100cm) all the time. does it mean condi does trash can dmg? not all the time.

im not saying that scepter is garbage-garbage. my assessment is that scepter (& staff) is fairly replaceable for another similarly focused weapon (like mirage axe), in a similar way to how daredevil staff, reaper gs, scg torch, temp wh and weaver sword easily replaced pre existing weapon options, which leads to suggest that they are what im calling ‘garbage’, or what you would better understand as ‘somewhat underpowered’

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@Noodle Ant.1605 said:

@Dadnir.5038 said:ppl say condi is ‘bad’ in fracs (exclu 100cm) all the time. does it mean condi does trash can dmg? not all the time.

im not saying that scepter is garbage-garbage. my assessment is that scepter (& staff) is fairly replaceable for another similarly focused weapon (like mirage axe), in a similar way to how daredevil staff, reaper gs, scg torch, temp wh and weaver sword easily replaced pre existing weapon options, which leads to suggest that they are what im calling ‘garbage’, or what you would better understand as ‘somewhat underpowered’

I do somewhat agree that daredevil's staff isn't far from core weapon but reaper's GS and scourge's torch make a way bigger difference than mesmer's scepter does for it's axe. I mean you can't even compare scourge's torch to the other necromancer's off hands (torch is 3 time more effective than any other off hand, while the mesmer's scepter would be at 90%-95% of the axe efficiency).

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