Power Block ICD bug

[Quadox.7834]

Power block is bugged and has a hidden 3 sec ICD on the damage and weakness (but not the cooldown increase part). I believe it has been like this since the defiance bar interrupt skill rework. "This trait can only damage enemies with defiance bars once per interval." Basically, it is supposed to have a 3 second interval on defiance bars in PvE, but it currently also has the same interval in PvP because of this bug.

Maybe someone could post it on the balance discord as I doubt the devs read this forum anymore. I have reported it ingame in the past.

[Kodama.6453]

I think they should just change the tooltip to reflect that damage and weakness have an ICD of 3 seconds...The trait is already pretty strong just from upping the interrupted cooldown from 4 seconds to 15 seconds. Interrupting a healing skill with this is huge.

[Quadox.7834]

@Kodama.6453 said:I think they should just change the tooltip to reflect that damage and weakness have an ICD of 3 seconds...The trait is already pretty strong just from upping the interrupted cooldown from 4 seconds to 15 seconds. Interrupting a healing skill with this is huge.

No. Mantra is the problem, NOT powerblock.

[Kodama.6453]

@Quadox.7834 said:

@Kodama.6453 said:I think they should just change the tooltip to reflect that damage and weakness have an ICD of 3 seconds...The trait is already pretty strong just from upping the interrupted cooldown from 4 seconds to 15 seconds. Interrupting a healing skill with this is huge.

No. Mantra is the problem, NOT powerblock.

I never said it is problematic, just that the trait is already really strong just because it increases the cooldown of skills by 11 seconds if you interrupt an enemy. Which is an effect that can have a huge impact on fights.

This got me curious, tho. Impacting Disruption from Daredevil has the same wording like this trait, does it also just proc every 3 seconds or on every disrupt? Can someone clarify this?

[RedAvenged.5217]

The ‘balance discord’ is a well known source of harassment where they go as far as to reward ppl for threats

[JazzXman.7018]

@"Quadox.7834" said:No. Mantra is the problem, NOT powerblock.

i wanna disagree here, neither pb nor the daze mantra are a problem (pain mantra is a different story for sure). the max range instant cast cc mimimi is a too trivial look on the whole interrupt cc mechanic i think.

anet made since game release a clear line between hard lock down cc with casttime, main offensive purpose to pin down the target (preventing dodging, free movement and skill use) for hitting follow up dmg versus short soft cc (max 1 sec daze) which only has good value when interrupting keyskills in keymoments, which is instant for good reasons since its the weakest cc in the game not preventing dodges or free movement and skill use only for a short time (important the daze is not allowed to be longer than 1 sec, 2 secs daze is not an interupt focused cc anymore and for good reasons also not instant and the nerf of the daze duration from 1,5 secs to 1 sec on mes f3 and mantra was very good, just as deleting the instant stun on f3 was best balance change ever) and mantra as an interrupt tool is also instant bc gw2 is a very fast game with short average casttime of 3/4 secs.

the requirement to interrupt then also adds the higher skill requirement compared to other cc and dmg skills which have way more value on simple hit and also adds the needed counterplay to the instant mechanic (aside form the long mantra recharge what adds additional counter abilities to the inttant charges other skills dont have).

short! daze is the only rupt focused/ centered cc in gw2, since all other skill-use-preventing-cc-types (but also immob) have way bigger value when not interuting anything, means way more value on simple hit already. so interupting is not their main purpose (what makes sense since skills with reactive casttime/animation means decent castime/ animation cannot rly reactive/ interactive interupt castskills with 3/4 secs casttime since you have latency+human reaction time what eats a big part of that casttime already, so you only can rupt by precasting casttime-cc on guess/ expectation and the interupt attempt then has an instant counter with instant stow, means decent player with awareness will stow all your casttime cc to prevent the interrupt-trait proc by nearly 100%).

means lit having only dodgeable casttime cc in the game will delete interrupt gameplay from the game and traiting into pb will not be valuable enough since too inconsitent, too situational compared to nearly perma value traits like passive dmg modifier, too high risky, too high skill requirement to get the trait reward. why use such an situational, inconsitent, risky and high skill ceiling trait when you can just use a passive dmg modifier trait that gives value nearly permanently and you as a player dont need to think about that trait ever.

ppl who get interupted by casttime cc like torch phantasm, well animated and slow sword ambush leaps, warrior hammer skills etc (mes offhand pistol imo is too short casttime and too bad animation for an overly long 2 secs lock down hard cc stun skill on a burst class like mes btw, pistol is broken) rly should think about using their time to improve their awareness and mechanical skill instead wasting their time to cry on forum or discord to get something deleted i (and others i know) counterplay on purpose and successful vs all skill lvl mesmers all day long, even on classes i cant play that well and that also in outnumbered situations and when getting +1ed by a pb mantra mes. (generally spoken not directed to you quadox!)

while lock down hard cc (stun, knockdown ect, but also fear and taunt) can be a killer by itself, on simple hit already and for that ofc has a decent casttime and animation you can react to. and pb as one of the most creative, best desinged and balanced highest skill ceiling (interrupt-) traits even increase the need to interupt keyskills in keymoments for enough value from the trait. pb obviously was designed with an instant interupt tool like daze mantra in mind.

so the interupt mechanic has more than enough counters, just timed dodges is not one of them. but for that it has downtimes other (cast-)skills dont have.

• higher skill requirement/ bigger effort to get the skill/ trait reward from the need to interupt instead big reward just on simple hit already
• long 2,25 secs mantra recharge adds a vulnerable time to the mesmer he can be free pressured and easy be interupted even by casttime hard cc, has a downtime in impact on the fight for at least the recharge duration (if mesmer is forced to disengage to cover the recharge the downtime is even longer) or mes is forced to use other big cds like stealth, teleports to cover the recharge
• no stow possible on instant skills (yes being instant by itself is not only a good thing, it has an inherent downtime of losing bait potential from not being able to stow. so you can bait the mes into wasting the instant cc with instant stow but the mes cannot stow to counter that, so when you work with human reaction time well you can easy make the mes waste the cc no matter how good the mes is, since that is simply how the human brain is functioning. and notice: you dont need to use your heal to stow-bait)
• being interupted on keyskills in keymoments only requires a short temporary cover not like "value on simply hit castskills" which are way less situational (its always a good time to hit dmg for example outside of extremas like target is invuln ofc) and make the interrupt-cc-uses for the opponents more predictable (since it is quite obvious which skills in what situations have the most value to interupt for the mes), so a bit of the instant value (not being reactive dodgeable) is directly countered by the added higher ability to predict when/ for what the mes will use the instant cc from the need to interrupt keyskills in keymoments.
• higher costs of choice since interrupt cc has a way bigger defensive part than the more offensive lock down cc. means you can easy bait mesmers rupt cds (but also teleports) by making him use it to survive, to interrupt/avoid your dmg and your hard cc. but ofc when you let a mesmer freecast and free rotate then you/ your team misplayed and god forbit that mes is not nerfed enough that it still has value when not pressured (in a duel where you facetank all burst and dont pressure out cds from the mes before you need to heal, alsoi admit that condi mes still has pretty oppressive and easy applied low effort condi pressure and signet of illusion what is needed to carry one dodge mirage is also not rly healthy and should be reworked)/ god forbit mes still has impact when freecasting :scream:

imo the only things the mantra/ pb mechanic needs in terms of healthy, skillful and fair balance/ design is to increase the cd between the instant daze charges around 1-2 secs, since it is a bit unlucky that the daze charge cd is exactly the same than the stow/ selfrupt/ normal rupt cd. an opponent should be able to get a skill he used to bait through before the second daze charge from mantra is rdy. also pls add the tooltip into the mesmers buffbar back so enemies can see that a mes has mantra charges rdy and how many.

but ofc pb/ mantra is annoying to deal with when we casually wanna brainless spam low cd high impcat skills and facetank happly and suddently a class like mes with an interactive interrupt mechanic requires you to enable your brain to counterplay it.

[Quadox.7834]

@JazzXman.7018 said:

@"Quadox.7834" said:No. Mantra is the problem, NOT powerblock.

i wanna disagree here, neither pb nor the daze mantra are a problem (pain mantra is a different story for sure). the max range instant cast cc mimimi is a too trivial look on the whole interrupt cc mechanic i think.

anet made since game release a clear line between hard lock down cc with casttime, main offensive purpose to pin down the target (preventing dodging, free movement and skill use) for hitting follow up dmg versus short soft cc (max 1 sec daze) which only has good value when interrupting keyskills in keymoments, which is instant for good reasons since its the weakest cc in the game not preventing dodges or free movement and skill use only for a short time (important the daze is not allowed to be longer than 1 sec, 2 secs daze is not an interupt focused cc anymore and for good reasons also not instant and the nerf of the daze duration from 1,5 secs to 1 sec on mes f3 and mantra was very good, just as deleting the instant stun on f3 was best balance change ever) and mantra as an interrupt tool is also instant bc gw2 is a very fast game with short average casttime of 3/4 secs.

the requirement to interrupt then also adds the higher skill requirement compared to other cc and dmg skills which have way more value on simple hit and also adds the needed counterplay to the instant mechanic (aside form the long mantra recharge what adds additional counter abilities to the inttant charges other skills dont have).

short! daze is the only rupt focused/ centered cc in gw2, since all other skill-use-preventing-cc-types (but also immob) have way bigger value when not interuting anything, means way more value on simple hit already. so interupting is not their main purpose (what makes sense since skills with reactive casttime/animation means decent castime/ animation cannot rly reactive/ interactive interupt castskills with 3/4 secs casttime since you have latency+human reaction time what eats a big part of that casttime already, so you only can rupt by precasting casttime-cc on guess/ expectation and the interupt attempt then has an instant counter with instant stow, means decent player with awareness will stow all your casttime cc to prevent the interrupt-trait proc by nearly 100%).

means lit having only dodgeable casttime cc in the game will delete interrupt gameplay from the game and traiting into pb will not be valuable enough since too inconsitent, too situational compared to nearly perma value traits like passive dmg modifier, too high risky, too high skill requirement to get the trait reward. why use such an situational, inconsitent, risky and high skill ceiling trait when you can just use a passive dmg modifier trait that gives value nearly permanently and you as a player dont need to think about that trait ever.

ppl who get interupted by casttime cc like torch phantasm, well animated and slow sword ambush leaps, warrior hammer skills etc (mes offhand pistol imo is too short casttime and too bad animation for an overly long 2 secs lock down hard cc stun skill on a burst class like mes btw, pistol is broken) rly should think about using their time to improve their awareness and mechanical skill instead wasting their time to cry on forum or discord to get something deleted i (and others i know) counterplay on purpose and successful vs all skill lvl mesmers all day long, even on classes i cant play that well and that also in outnumbered situations and when getting +1ed by a pb mantra mes. (generally spoken not directed to you quadox!)

while lock down hard cc (stun, knockdown ect, but also fear and taunt) can be a killer by itself, on simple hit already and for that ofc has a decent casttime and animation you can react to. and pb as one of the most creative, best desinged and balanced highest skill ceiling (interrupt-) traits even increase the need to interupt keyskills in keymoments for enough value from the trait. pb obviously was designed with an instant interupt tool like daze mantra in mind.

so the interupt mechanic has more than enough counters, just timed dodges is not one of them. but for that it has downtimes other (cast-)skills dont have.

• higher skill requirement/ bigger effort to get the skill/ trait reward from the need to interupt instead big reward just on simple hit already
• long 2,25 secs mantra recharge adds a vulnerable time to the mesmer he can be free pressured and easy be interupted even by casttime hard cc, has a downtime in impact on the fight for at least the recharge duration (if mesmer is forced to disengage to cover the recharge the downtime is even longer) or mes is forced to use other big cds like stealth, teleports to cover the recharge
• no stow possible on instant skills (yes being instant by itself is not only a good thing, it has an inherent downtime of losing bait potential from not being able to stow. so you can bait the mes into wasting the instant cc with instant stow but the mes cannot stow to counter that, so when you work with human reaction time well you can easy make the mes waste the cc no matter how good the mes is, since that is simply how the human brain is functioning. and notice: you dont need to use your heal to stow-bait)
• being interupted on keyskills in keymoments only requires a short temporary cover not like "value on simply hit castskills" which are way less situational (its always a good time to hit dmg for example outside of extremas like target is invuln ofc) and make the interrupt-cc-uses for the opponents more predictable (since it is quite obvious which skills in what situations have the most value to interupt for the mes), so a bit of the instant value (not being reactive dodgeable) is directly countered by the added higher ability to predict when/ for what the mes will use the instant cc from the need to interrupt keyskills in keymoments.
• higher costs of choice since interrupt cc has a way bigger defensive part than the more offensive lock down cc. means you can easy bait mesmers rupt cds (but also teleports) by making him use it to survive, to interrupt/avoid your dmg and your hard cc. but ofc when you let a mesmer freecast and free rotate then you/ your team misplayed and god forbit that mes is not nerfed enough that it still has value when not pressured (in a duel where you facetank all burst and dont pressure out cds from the mes before you need to heal, alsoi admit that condi mes still has pretty oppressive and easy applied low effort condi pressure and signet of illusion what is needed to carry one dodge mirage is also not rly healthy and should be reworked)/ god forbit mes still has impact when freecasting :scream:

imo the only things the mantra/ pb mechanic needs in terms of healthy, skillful and fair balance/ design is to increase the cd between the instant daze charges around 1-2 secs, since it is a bit unlucky that the daze charge cd is exactly the same than the stow/ selfrupt/ normal rupt cd. an opponent should be able to get a skill he used to bait through before the second daze charge from mantra is rdy. also pls add the tooltip into the mesmers buffbar back so enemies can see that a mes has mantra charges rdy and how many.

but ofc pb/ mantra is annoying to deal with when we casually wanna brainless spam low cd high impcat skills and facetank happly and suddently a class like mes with an interactive interrupt mechanic requires you to enable your brain to counterplay it.

1. I agree with you that instant/very quick skills do have a place. Teapot, Floody, and some others probably haven't played many PvP games outside of guild wars because they are stuck in the mentality that you have to be able to react to everything. In other words, everything essentially needs to have 1/2+ cast time. Anyone who has played fighting games knows that this is not the case and that prediction, pattern recognition, mixups, and so forth, are key and valid. This is what we call "reads".
2. Rather than thinking that we must be able to react to everything, we should think about opportunity cost and risk. This is where you can argue back and forth, but I would say MoD is in the risk-zone of being "too low risk".
3. For me, MoD would not exist in its current form in my "perfect game state", however in the game right now there are many worse offenders.
4. Floody in Teapot's stream chat complained that if he baits mantra by stowing the heal, it still goes on 4 sec cooldown so he still dies. This is true, but what he neglects is that the same thing is the case if somebody tries to interrupt him with a non-instant skill. For instance 1. Floody uses his heal skill 2. I use greatsword knock 3. Floody either has to tank it, which puts his heal on 15 second cooldown OR he has to dodge the wave, which puts his heal on 4 second cooldown and he dies... as you can see, the result is similar.
5. Teapot's problem with mantra was that its failure depends on the Mesmer fucking up, i.e. in his opinion "you didn't play well, the Mesmer fucked up". In opposition to this, Teapot gave an example of what he called a "good interaction", which I believe was a Necro using Spinal Shivers on an Engi. Because Spinal isn't instant, the Engi can choose to dodge it. In return, the Necro can outplay the Engi on an additional level by stowing the Spinal. So we supposedly get multiple levels of mind games. Only, there is a problem with this - dodge is in fact, just like mantra, instant. So as long as the Engi dodges properly (at the very end of the Spinal cast), the Necro has zero chance to cancel his skill beyond prediction/luck. So we are in fact in a very similar situation as with MoD, namely that the Necro being able to stow his Spinal depends on the Engi fucking up. "The Necro didn't play well, the the Engi fucked up" (specifically, by dodging early for no reason).

[JazzXman.7018]

@Quadox.7834 said:

@JazzXman.7018 said:

@Quadox.7834 said:No. Mantra is the problem, NOT powerblock.

i wanna disagree here, neither pb nor the daze mantra are a problem (pain mantra is a different story for sure). the max range instant cast cc mimimi is a too trivial look on the whole interrupt cc mechanic i think.

anet made since game release a clear line between hard lock down cc with casttime, main offensive purpose to pin down the target (preventing dodging, free movement and skill use) for hitting follow up dmg versus short soft cc (max 1 sec daze) which only has good value when interrupting keyskills in keymoments, which is instant for good reasons since its the weakest cc in the game not preventing dodges or free movement and skill use only for a short time (important the daze is not allowed to be longer than 1 sec, 2 secs daze is not an interupt focused cc anymore and for good reasons also not instant and the nerf of the daze duration from 1,5 secs to 1 sec on mes f3 and mantra was very good, just as deleting the instant stun on f3 was best balance change ever) and mantra as an interrupt tool is also instant bc gw2 is a very fast game with short average casttime of 3/4 secs.

the requirement to interrupt then also adds the higher skill requirement compared to other cc and dmg skills which have way more value on simple hit and also adds the needed counterplay to the instant mechanic (aside form the long mantra recharge what adds additional counter abilities to the inttant charges other skills dont have).

short! daze is the only rupt focused/ centered cc in gw2, since all other skill-use-preventing-cc-types (but also immob) have way bigger value when not interuting anything, means way more value on simple hit already. so interupting is not their main purpose (what makes sense since skills with reactive casttime/animation means decent castime/ animation cannot rly reactive/ interactive interupt castskills with 3/4 secs casttime since you have latency+human reaction time what eats a big part of that casttime already, so you only can rupt by precasting casttime-cc on guess/ expectation and the interupt attempt then has an instant counter with instant stow, means decent player with awareness will stow all your casttime cc to prevent the interrupt-trait proc by nearly 100%).

means lit having only dodgeable casttime cc in the game will delete interrupt gameplay from the game and traiting into pb will not be valuable enough since too inconsitent, too situational compared to nearly perma value traits like passive dmg modifier, too high risky, too high skill requirement to get the trait reward. why use such an situational, inconsitent, risky and high skill ceiling trait when you can just use a passive dmg modifier trait that gives value nearly permanently and you as a player dont need to think about that trait ever.

ppl who get interupted by casttime cc like torch phantasm, well animated and slow sword ambush leaps, warrior hammer skills etc (mes offhand pistol imo is too short casttime and too bad animation for an overly long 2 secs lock down hard cc stun skill on a burst class like mes btw, pistol is broken) rly should think about using their time to improve their awareness and mechanical skill instead wasting their time to cry on forum or discord to get something deleted i (and others i know) counterplay on purpose and successful vs all skill lvl mesmers all day long, even on classes i cant play that well and that also in outnumbered situations and when getting +1ed by a pb mantra mes. (generally spoken not directed to you quadox!)

while lock down hard cc (stun, knockdown ect, but also fear and taunt) can be a killer by itself, on simple hit already and for that ofc has a decent casttime and animation you can react to. and pb as one of the most creative, best desinged and balanced highest skill ceiling (interrupt-) traits even increase the need to interupt keyskills in keymoments for enough value from the trait. pb obviously was designed with an instant interupt tool like daze mantra in mind.

so the interupt mechanic has more than enough counters, just timed dodges is not one of them. but for that it has downtimes other (cast-)skills dont have.

• higher skill requirement/ bigger effort to get the skill/ trait reward from the need to interupt instead big reward just on simple hit already
• long 2,25 secs mantra recharge adds a vulnerable time to the mesmer he can be free pressured and easy be interupted even by casttime hard cc, has a downtime in impact on the fight for at least the recharge duration (if mesmer is forced to disengage to cover the recharge the downtime is even longer) or mes is forced to use other big cds like stealth, teleports to cover the recharge
• no stow possible on instant skills (yes being instant by itself is not only a good thing, it has an inherent downtime of losing bait potential from not being able to stow. so you can bait the mes into wasting the instant cc with instant stow but the mes cannot stow to counter that, so when you work with human reaction time well you can easy make the mes waste the cc no matter how good the mes is, since that is simply how the human brain is functioning. and notice: you dont need to use your heal to stow-bait)
• being interupted on keyskills in keymoments only requires a short temporary cover not like "value on simply hit castskills" which are way less situational (its always a good time to hit dmg for example outside of extremas like target is invuln ofc) and make the interrupt-cc-uses for the opponents more predictable (since it is quite obvious which skills in what situations have the most value to interupt for the mes), so a bit of the instant value (not being reactive dodgeable) is directly countered by the added higher ability to predict when/ for what the mes will use the instant cc from the need to interrupt keyskills in keymoments.
• higher costs of choice since interrupt cc has a way bigger defensive part than the more offensive lock down cc. means you can easy bait mesmers rupt cds (but also teleports) by making him use it to survive, to interrupt/avoid your dmg and your hard cc. but ofc when you let a mesmer freecast and free rotate then you/ your team misplayed and god forbit that mes is not nerfed enough that it still has value when not pressured (in a duel where you facetank all burst and dont pressure out cds from the mes before you need to heal, alsoi admit that condi mes still has pretty oppressive and easy applied low effort condi pressure and signet of illusion what is needed to carry one dodge mirage is also not rly healthy and should be reworked)/ god forbit mes still has impact when freecasting :scream:

imo the only things the mantra/ pb mechanic needs in terms of healthy, skillful and fair balance/ design is to increase the cd between the instant daze charges around 1-2 secs, since it is a bit unlucky that the daze charge cd is exactly the same than the stow/ selfrupt/ normal rupt cd. an opponent should be able to get a skill he used to bait through before the second daze charge from mantra is rdy. also pls add the tooltip into the mesmers buffbar back so enemies can see that a mes has mantra charges rdy and how many.

but ofc pb/ mantra is annoying to deal with when we casually wanna brainless spam low cd high impcat skills and facetank happly and suddently a class like mes with an interactive interrupt mechanic requires you to enable your brain to counterplay it.

1. I agree with you that instant/very quick skills do have a place. Teapot, Floody, and some others probably haven't played many PvP games outside of guild wars because they are stuck in the mentality that you have to be able to react to everything. In other words, everything essentially needs to have 1/2+ cast time. Anyone who has played fighting games knows that this is not the case and that prediction, pattern recognition, mixups, and so forth, are key and valid. This is what we call "reads".
2. Rather than thinking that we must be able to react to everything, we should think about opportunity cost and risk. This is where you can argue back and forth, but I would say MoD is in the risk-zone of being "too low risk".
3. For me, MoD would not exist in its current form in my "perfect game state", however in the game right now there are many worse offenders.
4. Floody in Teapot's stream chat complained that if he baits mantra by stowing the heal, it still goes on 4 sec cooldown so he still dies. This is true, but what he neglects is that the
   same thing
   is the case if somebody tries to interrupt him with a non-instant skill. For instance 1. Floody uses his heal skill 2. I use greatsword knock 3. Floody either has to tank it, which puts his heal on 15 second cooldown OR he has to dodge the wave, which puts his heal on 4 second cooldown and he dies... as you can see, the result is similar.
5. Teapot's problem with mantra was that its failure depends on the Mesmer kitten up, i.e. in his opinion "you didn't play well, the Mesmer kitten up". In opposition to this, Teapot gave an example of what he called a "good interaction", which I believe was a Necro using Spinal Shivers on an Engi. Because Spinal isn't instant, the Engi can choose to dodge it. In return, the Necro can outplay the Engi on an additional level by stowing the Spinal. So we supposedly get multiple levels of mind games. Only, there is a problem with this - dodge is in fact, just like mantra,
   instant
   . So as long as the Engi dodges properly (at the very end of the Spinal cast), the Necro has zero chance to cancel his skill beyond prediction/luck. So we are in fact in a very similar situation as with MoD, namely that the Necro being able to stow his Spinal
   depends on the Engi kitten up
   . "The Necro didn't play well, the the Engi kitten up" (specifically, by dodging early for no reason).

yeah we are around 95% on the same boat i would say :) i just still miss why you think mantra is in the context of gw2 unhealthy/something should not exist (and i mean the basic, general game design, not that there is unbalanced/ powercreeped stuff or worse mechanics on other classes which should not exists bc ofc we dont wanna argue like justifying one unhealthy unbalanced bad desing with stuff that is even more unbalanced on other classes, i also dont wanna do that) why you think its not well designed for a game like gw2 with the overall short average casttime and when saying that instant skills are ok as long as not too strong by themself what a short daze clearly isnt etc, esp after all you said. mantra as interrupt tool, esp with a well designed trait like pb for me is the most skilled and challenging and fair and interesting interaction i could find in the game. and im a challenge player when i feel i get carried by something i dont have fun, so i rly observed hard if the instant mantra has those carry things overall and i know the interaction from both sides of the fight and that not only mes vs mes but also from povs of other classes.

my point is, that mantra in a game like gw2 (fast game with in average pretty short casttimes) is needed and not unhealthy or even broken how it is, and that it is ranged instant for good reasons, esp for skillful and fair traits like pb which rly require to not random interrupt whatever whenever but is highly tactical and already by itself very situational and not like a perma passive reward other traits provide or unhealthy like old ci trait where you could kill ppl lit with a random autoattack rupt. imo mantra/pb still has enough and fair counterplay, it requires skill to play and skill to counterplay it and that is exactly what we want to have more in the game and not less i think.

so esp when i read what you just wrote i dont get what you would change on mantra without making the whole pb interupt mechanic too risky, too less rewarding for the effort and skill requirement you have to put in on several lvls esp compared to other skill mechanics which are more consistent to nearly perma impactful with way less player effort and brainwork needed?

i atm still cant see any changes would be needed and would make mantra more skilled, except the 2 things i already mentioned (buffbar tooltip for mantra charges and bit longer icd between the daze charges). since i think that mantra/ pb lit are one of the best and most challening and interesting and fair desinged things in the game, and has already enough and fair counterplay. and that no matter what the state of other classes are, mantra is not only ok/acceptable bc atm other classes are even more broken, i think mantra is in general not broken, at least as long as you dont have broken interrupt traits or broken cc-spam-reward traits interacting with it (like old ci, old confounding, old lost time, or having too long daze duration on f3 and mantra). and all those things got deleted or nerfed already for good reasons and you never saw me complaining about any of that. even if all other classes would not have unbalanced stuff themself (the relation to other classes is irrelevant, since we ofc dont want to justify broken stuff on mes with even more broken stuff on other classes, that was never my point) i think the pb/ mantra interrupt mechanic on mes is well designed, fair and balanced and has exactly the counterplay abilities it needs to be fair, just them requiring a bit more active brainwork to counterplay than most other stuff in the game (but thats lit mesmers basic class problem in this casual game and why it gets so much hate and the more hate the lower the overall skill lvl and game knowledge gets).

tldr: so what would you change on daze mantra and where you see the problem?

btw i think the problem is not that they played only gw2 i think the problem might be, that they are too stuck in old slowmotion mmo styles where you couldnt even move while casting, games without fast action combat etc. the example with that game with global cooldowns esp made me think that

[Quadox.7834]

@JazzXman.7018 said:

@Quadox.7834 said:

@JazzXman.7018 said:

@Quadox.7834 said:No. Mantra is the problem, NOT powerblock.

i wanna disagree here, neither pb nor the daze mantra are a problem (pain mantra is a different story for sure). the max range instant cast cc mimimi is a too trivial look on the whole interrupt cc mechanic i think.

anet made since game release a clear line between hard lock down cc with casttime, main offensive purpose to pin down the target (preventing dodging, free movement and skill use) for hitting follow up dmg versus short soft cc (max 1 sec daze) which only has good value when interrupting keyskills in keymoments, which is instant for good reasons since its the weakest cc in the game not preventing dodges or free movement and skill use only for a short time (important the daze is not allowed to be longer than 1 sec, 2 secs daze is not an interupt focused cc anymore and for good reasons also not instant and the nerf of the daze duration from 1,5 secs to 1 sec on mes f3 and mantra was very good, just as deleting the instant stun on f3 was best balance change ever) and mantra as an interrupt tool is also instant bc gw2 is a very fast game with short average casttime of 3/4 secs.

the requirement to interrupt then also adds the higher skill requirement compared to other cc and dmg skills which have way more value on simple hit and also adds the needed counterplay to the instant mechanic (aside form the long mantra recharge what adds additional counter abilities to the inttant charges other skills dont have).

short! daze is the only rupt focused/ centered cc in gw2, since all other skill-use-preventing-cc-types (but also immob) have way bigger value when not interuting anything, means way more value on simple hit already. so interupting is not their main purpose (what makes sense since skills with reactive casttime/animation means decent castime/ animation cannot rly reactive/ interactive interupt castskills with 3/4 secs casttime since you have latency+human reaction time what eats a big part of that casttime already, so you only can rupt by precasting casttime-cc on guess/ expectation and the interupt attempt then has an instant counter with instant stow, means decent player with awareness will stow all your casttime cc to prevent the interrupt-trait proc by nearly 100%).

means lit having only dodgeable casttime cc in the game will delete interrupt gameplay from the game and traiting into pb will not be valuable enough since too inconsitent, too situational compared to nearly perma value traits like passive dmg modifier, too high risky, too high skill requirement to get the trait reward. why use such an situational, inconsitent, risky and high skill ceiling trait when you can just use a passive dmg modifier trait that gives value nearly permanently and you as a player dont need to think about that trait ever.

ppl who get interupted by casttime cc like torch phantasm, well animated and slow sword ambush leaps, warrior hammer skills etc (mes offhand pistol imo is too short casttime and too bad animation for an overly long 2 secs lock down hard cc stun skill on a burst class like mes btw, pistol is broken) rly should think about using their time to improve their awareness and mechanical skill instead wasting their time to cry on forum or discord to get something deleted i (and others i know) counterplay on purpose and successful vs all skill lvl mesmers all day long, even on classes i cant play that well and that also in outnumbered situations and when getting +1ed by a pb mantra mes. (generally spoken not directed to you quadox!)

while lock down hard cc (stun, knockdown ect, but also fear and taunt) can be a killer by itself, on simple hit already and for that ofc has a decent casttime and animation you can react to. and pb as one of the most creative, best desinged and balanced highest skill ceiling (interrupt-) traits even increase the need to interupt keyskills in keymoments for enough value from the trait. pb obviously was designed with an instant interupt tool like daze mantra in mind.

so the interupt mechanic has more than enough counters, just timed dodges is not one of them. but for that it has downtimes other (cast-)skills dont have.

• higher skill requirement/ bigger effort to get the skill/ trait reward from the need to interupt instead big reward just on simple hit already
• long 2,25 secs mantra recharge adds a vulnerable time to the mesmer he can be free pressured and easy be interupted even by casttime hard cc, has a downtime in impact on the fight for at least the recharge duration (if mesmer is forced to disengage to cover the recharge the downtime is even longer) or mes is forced to use other big cds like stealth, teleports to cover the recharge
• no stow possible on instant skills (yes being instant by itself is not only a good thing, it has an inherent downtime of losing bait potential from not being able to stow. so you can bait the mes into wasting the instant cc with instant stow but the mes cannot stow to counter that, so when you work with human reaction time well you can easy make the mes waste the cc no matter how good the mes is, since that is simply how the human brain is functioning. and notice: you dont need to use your heal to stow-bait)
• being interupted on keyskills in keymoments only requires a short temporary cover not like "value on simply hit castskills" which are way less situational (its always a good time to hit dmg for example outside of extremas like target is invuln ofc) and make the interrupt-cc-uses for the opponents more predictable (since it is quite obvious which skills in what situations have the most value to interupt for the mes), so a bit of the instant value (not being reactive dodgeable) is directly countered by the added higher ability to predict when/ for what the mes will use the instant cc from the need to interrupt keyskills in keymoments.
• higher costs of choice since interrupt cc has a way bigger defensive part than the more offensive lock down cc. means you can easy bait mesmers rupt cds (but also teleports) by making him use it to survive, to interrupt/avoid your dmg and your hard cc. but ofc when you let a mesmer freecast and free rotate then you/ your team misplayed and god forbit that mes is not nerfed enough that it still has value when not pressured (in a duel where you facetank all burst and dont pressure out cds from the mes before you need to heal, alsoi admit that condi mes still has pretty oppressive and easy applied low effort condi pressure and signet of illusion what is needed to carry one dodge mirage is also not rly healthy and should be reworked)/ god forbit mes still has impact when freecasting :scream:

imo the only things the mantra/ pb mechanic needs in terms of healthy, skillful and fair balance/ design is to increase the cd between the instant daze charges around 1-2 secs, since it is a bit unlucky that the daze charge cd is exactly the same than the stow/ selfrupt/ normal rupt cd. an opponent should be able to get a skill he used to bait through before the second daze charge from mantra is rdy. also pls add the tooltip into the mesmers buffbar back so enemies can see that a mes has mantra charges rdy and how many.

but ofc pb/ mantra is annoying to deal with when we casually wanna brainless spam low cd high impcat skills and facetank happly and suddently a class like mes with an interactive interrupt mechanic requires you to enable your brain to counterplay it.

1. I agree with you that instant/very quick skills do have a place. Teapot, Floody, and some others probably haven't played many PvP games outside of guild wars because they are stuck in the mentality that you have to be able to react to everything. In other words, everything essentially needs to have 1/2+ cast time. Anyone who has played fighting games knows that this is not the case and that prediction, pattern recognition, mixups, and so forth, are key and valid. This is what we call "reads".
2. Rather than thinking that we must be able to react to everything, we should think about opportunity cost and risk. This is where you can argue back and forth, but I would say MoD is in the risk-zone of being "too low risk".
3. For me, MoD would not exist in its current form in my "perfect game state", however in the game right now there are many worse offenders.
4. Floody in Teapot's stream chat complained that if he baits mantra by stowing the heal, it still goes on 4 sec cooldown so he still dies. This is true, but what he neglects is that the
   same thing
   is the case if somebody tries to interrupt him with a non-instant skill. For instance 1. Floody uses his heal skill 2. I use greatsword knock 3. Floody either has to tank it, which puts his heal on 15 second cooldown OR he has to dodge the wave, which puts his heal on 4 second cooldown and he dies... as you can see, the result is similar.
5. Teapot's problem with mantra was that its failure depends on the Mesmer kitten up, i.e. in his opinion "you didn't play well, the Mesmer kitten up". In opposition to this, Teapot gave an example of what he called a "good interaction", which I believe was a Necro using Spinal Shivers on an Engi. Because Spinal isn't instant, the Engi can choose to dodge it. In return, the Necro can outplay the Engi on an additional level by stowing the Spinal. So we supposedly get multiple levels of mind games. Only, there is a problem with this - dodge is in fact, just like mantra,
   instant
   . So as long as the Engi dodges properly (at the very end of the Spinal cast), the Necro has zero chance to cancel his skill beyond prediction/luck. So we are in fact in a very similar situation as with MoD, namely that the Necro being able to stow his Spinal
   depends on the Engi kitten up
   . "The Necro didn't play well, the the Engi kitten up" (specifically, by dodging early for no reason).

yeah we are around 95% on the same boat i would say :) i just still miss why you think mantra is in the context of gw2 unhealthy/something should not exist (and i mean the basic, general game design, not that there is unbalanced/ powercreeped stuff or worse mechanics on other classes which should not exists bc ofc we dont wanna argue like justifying one unhealthy unbalanced bad desing with stuff that is even more unbalanced on other classes, i also dont wanna do that) why you think its not well designed for a game like gw2 with the overall short average casttime and when saying that instant skills are ok as long as not too strong by themself what a short daze clearly isnt etc, esp after all you said. mantra as interrupt tool, esp with a well designed trait like pb for me is the most skilled and challenging and fair and interesting interaction i could find in the game. and im a challenge player when i feel i get carried by something i dont have fun, so i rly observed hard if the instant mantra has those carry things overall and i know the interaction from both sides of the fight and that not only mes vs mes but also from povs of other classes.

my point is, that mantra in a game like gw2 (fast game with in average pretty short casttimes) is needed and not unhealthy or even broken how it is, and that it is ranged instant for good reasons, esp for skillful and fair traits like pb which rly require to not random interrupt whatever whenever but is highly tactical and already by itself very situational and not like a perma passive reward other traits provide or unhealthy like old ci trait where you could kill ppl lit with a random autoattack rupt. imo mantra/pb still has enough and fair counterplay, it requires skill to play and skill to counterplay it and that is exactly what we want to have more in the game and not less i think.

so esp when i read what you just wrote i dont get what you would change on mantra without making the whole pb interupt mechanic too risky, too less rewarding for the effort and skill requirement you have to put in on several lvls esp compared to other skill mechanics which are more consistent to nearly perma impactful with way less player effort and brainwork needed?

i atm still cant see any changes would be needed and would make mantra more skilled, except the 2 things i already mentioned (buffbar tooltip for mantra charges and bit longer icd between the daze charges). since i think that mantra/ pb lit are one of the best and most challening and interesting and fair desinged things in the game, and has already enough and fair counterplay. and that no matter what the state of other classes are, mantra is not only ok/acceptable bc atm other classes are even more broken, i think mantra is in general not broken, at least as long as you dont have broken interrupt traits or broken cc-spam-reward traits interacting with it (like old ci, old confounding, old lost time, or having too long daze duration on f3 and mantra). and all those things got deleted or nerfed already for good reasons and you never saw me complaining about any of that. even if all other classes would not have unbalanced stuff themself (the relation to other classes is irrelevant, since we ofc dont want to justify broken stuff on mes with even more broken stuff on other classes, that was never my point) i think the pb/ mantra interrupt mechanic on mes is well designed, fair and balanced and has exactly the counterplay abilities it needs to be fair, just them requiring a bit more active brainwork to counterplay than most other stuff in the game (but thats lit mesmers basic class problem in this casual game and why it gets so much hate and the more hate the lower the overall skill lvl and game knowledge gets).

tldr: so what would you change on daze mantra and where you see the problem?

btw i think the problem is not that they played only gw2 i think the problem might be, that they are too stuck in old slowmotion mmo styles where you couldnt even move while casting, games without fast action combat etc. the example with that game with global cooldowns esp made me think that

Your suggestions of longer icd between charges and displaying charges in buff bar are great. In an ideal world, I would probably make it so that you could not use mantra while casting skills or while stunned. It would still have zero cast time. For example, like the Prestige on torch.

[JazzXman.7018]

@"Quadox.7834" said:Your suggestions of longer icd between charges and displaying charges in buff bar are great. In an ideal world, I would probably make it so that you could not use mantra while casting skills or while stunned. It would still have zero cast time. For example, like the Prestige on torch.

i see few problems here.

first of all you will touch the strengths directly linked to the instant nature (instant includes: can be used while cc-ed, can be used together with other skills, not reactive dodgeable), while mantra is balanced around being instant with having all the previously mentioned weaknesses to compensate for the 3 strong instant strengths. for example prestige has this hidden casttime (just no casttime-linked-animation, that is a difference to being instant, prestige is not instant the casttime is just very short and for that not mentioned in the tooltip, same with decoy) bc it doesnt need to interrupt anything for full value. prestige is since game realese not rly designed as instant skill and not balanced around that 3 strengths.

so just taking away strengths from mantra directly linked to the instant nature while not compensating will leave mantra too weak and inconsistent compared to other utilities (like a stealth and stunbreak from signet of midnight for example) and pb too weak/ inconsistent compared to other traits to worth taking for the higher effort and skilll requirement (since pb value is directly linked in having not clunky, not unhandy interupt tools with not too long cds you can bank on as a player, what is already pretty critical with the face your target requirement, what should be deleted from daze mantra in any case!). so you would need to compensate mantra in terms of deleting other weaknesses it currently has to compensate the deletion of 2 of the instant strengths and i dont see any compensation that wouldnt dumb down mantra/pb more than just leaving it instant, since the current weaknesses are also directly linked to the higehr skill requirement of the interrupt mechanic and a skill/ trait that only has good value not only when interupting randomly but interrupting keyskills in keymoments.

also we all agree, that the aggressive offensive uses of mantra/ pb, first of all the healrupt, is the most annoying and most impactful thing should have the biggest counterplay right? and you will delete a good part of the counterplay by deleting a lot of mantras defensive uses for the mes (defensive uses which are even important for a squishy class like mesmer), defensive opportunities which higher the costs of choice for what to use the mantra for, defensive opportunities which add harder decision making to the skill/trait for the mesmer and with that adds skill ceiling to the mechanic while also providing more counterplay to the offensive uses of the mechanic (mes cannot rupt your heal when he needs to use his cc skills and teleports to stay alive). so from the other pov of the side (when you fight against a pb/ mantra mes) you want to be able to pressure mesmer into defensive uses of the mantra to have a better chance to cover your heal by simply pressuring the mesmer into having cc skills on cd when you need to heal. so i would even say what you suggest with "not usable when stunned" is a lose lose situation for the target of the mes, for the mes itself and for the skill requirement of the mechanic by deleting harder decision makign wiht deleting opportunites (esp defensive opportunities).

since the abilies not "using while stunned" and "being able to use with other skills together" are mechanically inextricable (i think even in terms of programming, coding) its the same argumentation for the suggested "not usable with other skills" nerf. a nerf which also would need compensations by deleting other weaknesses from mantra/ pb what would most likely lower and not higher the skill cap.

also keep in mind when you delete half of the instant nature you also make the mechanic super clunky, clumsy and inconsistent. the face your target requirement on mantra proves that. face your target is usually not a requirement instant skills have, for the simple reason that instant skills have no automatic char alignment, that is simply not fair skill design, if they add face your target requirement oyu need to add automatic char alignment to make it not clunky.

if you want mantra to not be usable with other skills you need to give it some form of skill priority (a pretty high priority so it can rupt most other of mesmers own castskills instant to get the interupt right on time. like im midcast of gs4 berserkers and see someone wanna heal, i dont have the time to stow and then press mantra before skills with average casttime of 3/4 secs are already over, even when the target doesnt try to cover the heal/ doesnt try to counterplay my interrupt attempt). and how you organize priority to something like decoy and own heal then?

not to mention that anet never would take the effort to rework mantra that deeply, if anything they do the same half baked shit they did with the face your target thing while not addign automatic char alignment, what makes mantra already insanely inconsistent buggy and unhandy, means they would only add a hidden casttime but dont add stuff that castskills need to work unclunky and consistent and what would make the whole interrupt mechanic stay viable. so they would prob only add hidden casttime but not add senseful (for an interupt tool) skill priority, bc too much effort... i mean complains and problems solved when mantra is unusable right? typical anet move i can see already

[Quadox.7834]

@JazzXman.7018 said:

@"Quadox.7834" said:Your suggestions of longer icd between charges and displaying charges in buff bar are great. In an ideal world, I would probably make it so that you could not use mantra while casting skills or while stunned. It would still have zero cast time. For example, like the Prestige on torch.

i see few problems here.

first of all you will touch the strengths directly linked to the instant nature (instant includes: can be used while cc-ed, can be used together with other skills, not reactive dodgeable), while mantra is balanced around being instant with having all the previously mentioned weaknesses to compensate for the 3 strong instant strengths. for example prestige has this hidden casttime (just no casttime-linked-animation, that is a difference to being instant, prestige is not instant the casttime is just very short and for that not mentioned in the tooltip, same with decoy) bc it doesnt need to interrupt anything for full value. prestige is since game realese not rly designed as instant skill and not balanced around that 3 strengths.

so just taking away strengths from mantra directly linked to the instant nature while not compensating will leave mantra too weak and inconsistent compared to other utilities (like a stealth and stunbreak from signet of midnight for example) and pb too weak/ inconsistent compared to other traits to worth taking for the higher effort and skilll requirement (since pb value is directly linked in having not clunky, not unhandy interupt tools with not too long cds you can bank on as a player, what is already pretty critical with the face your target requirement, what should be deleted from daze mantra in any case!). so you would need to compensate mantra in terms of deleting other weaknesses it currently has to compensate the deletion of 2 of the instant strengths and i dont see any compensation that wouldnt dumb down mantra/pb more than just leaving it instant, since the current weaknesses are also directly linked to the higehr skill requirement of the interrupt mechanic and a skill/ trait that only has good value not only when interupting randomly but interrupting keyskills in keymoments.

also we all agree, that the aggressive offensive uses of mantra/ pb, first of all the healrupt, is the most annoying and most impactful thing should have the biggest counterplay right? and you will delete a good part of the counterplay by deleting a lot of mantras defensive uses for the mes (defensive uses which are even important for a squishy class like mesmer), defensive opportunities which higher the costs of choice for what to use the mantra for, defensive opportunities which add harder decision making to the skill/trait for the mesmer and with that adds skill ceiling to the mechanic while also providing more counterplay to the offensive uses of the mechanic (mes cannot rupt your heal when he needs to use his cc skills and teleports to stay alive). so from the other pov of the side (when you fight against a pb/ mantra mes) you want to be able to pressure mesmer into defensive uses of the mantra to have a better chance to cover your heal by simply pressuring the mesmer into having cc skills on cd when you need to heal. so i would even say what you suggest with "not usable when stunned" is a lose lose situation for the target of the mes, for the mes itself and for the skill requirement of the mechanic by deleting harder decision makign wiht deleting opportunites (esp defensive opportunities).

since the abilies not "using while stunned" and "being able to use with other skills together" are mechanically inextricable (i think even in terms of programming, coding) its the same argumentation for the suggested "not usable with other skills" nerf. a nerf which also would need compensations by deleting other weaknesses from mantra/ pb what would most likely lower and not higher the skill cap.

also keep in mind when you delete half of the instant nature you also make the mechanic super clunky, clumsy and inconsistent. the face your target requirement on mantra proves that. face your target is usually not a requirement instant skills have, for the simple reason that instant skills have no automatic char alignment, that is simply not fair skill design, if they add face your target requirement oyu need to add automatic char alignment to make it not clunky.

if you want mantra to not be usable with other skills you need to give it some form of skill priority (a pretty high priority so it can rupt most other of mesmers own castskills instant to get the interupt right on time. like im midcast of gs4 berserkers and see someone wanna heal, i dont have the time to stow and then press mantra before skills with average casttime of 3/4 secs are already over, even when the target doesnt try to cover the heal/ doesnt try to counterplay my interrupt attempt). and how you organize priority to something like decoy and own heal then?

not to mention that anet never would take the effort to rework mantra that deeply, if anything they do the same half baked kitten they did with the face your target thing while not addign automatic char alignment, what makes mantra already insanely inconsistent buggy and unhandy, means they would only add a hidden casttime but dont add stuff that castskills need to work unclunky and consistent and what would make the whole interrupt mechanic stay viable. so they would prob only add hidden casttime but not add senseful (for an interupt tool) skill priority, bc too much effort... i mean complains and problems solved when mantra is unusable right? typical anet move i can see already

It's about opportunity cost, this change would mean that you have to choose if you want to insta interrupt from range or if you want to cast a berserker, instead of dong both at once. And you couldn't do axe 2 + daze mantra like so many mesmers do. There would still be defensive uses, similar to how the blind on torch 4 has defensive uses, but you would have to use it before you get hit by the stun rather than after you got hit. However, all this is in an "ideal world", I think they should only do this change if they would commit to doing a full rework to a ton of skills on other classes.

About the priority, CC skills already have priority and so would mantra. For example, gs5 cancels gs4 but gs4 doesn't cancel gs5.

[JazzXman.7018]

did they accidently delete your last answer and mark my post as yours? me confused

[Quadox.7834]

29 minutes ago, JazzXman.7018 said:

did they accidently delete your last answer and mark my post as yours? me confused

Idk. Either way, it's pretty funny that they decided to take the effort to rework mantras but didnt touch any of what people found annoying about it.

[JazzXman.7018]

1 hour ago, Quadox.7834 said:

Idk. Either way, it's pretty funny that they decided to take the effort to rework mantras but didnt touch any of what people found annoying about it.

i just saw its just the new forum format looking weird. you cant rly see what is a quote and what is the own post anymore (at least in your last post and when you quote a quote of a quote).

 

anet doing great again with the "how to make stuff worse" agenda looking at the upcoming patch... the torment changes are lit the only ones i like in this pve patch (imagine buffing necros and engis even more since they already have the most potent builds atm).

 

yeah also the mantra change is purely pve driven and insanely bad. first of all they removed counterplay and didnt add any (im still highly sure it has more than enough counterplay in current state tho, also with being fully instant what it is for good reasons. so i could add some more essay to your last response about skill prioritys and why i dont like your suggetsions and also dont think those nerfs are needed to mantra even when other classes are balanced better and less broken but i think with the upcoming patch it doesnt matter anyway anymore right? but if you are interested in my answer just say and i add it later. one hint: casttime hard cc skills have priority since they have value outside of interrupting, they have big impact on simpel hit already. mantra doesnt have priority since its not needed for an instant skill that can be casted together with other castskills. and an interupt tool that requires you to interrupt yourself in lot of cases adds too much self punishment to the interupt- playstyle, which already has way more situational, less consistant trait/ skill reward and way higher skill requirement and effort lvl).

 

so yes removing the active recharge is plain stupid in terms of skillful balance and fair counterplay for the opponent. also do we rename mantras to shouts now or what? since thats what they are then, simple instant ammo shouts... they removed the thing that made the mantra design so much better than instant shouts for skills you want to be or need to be instant.

 

pretty stupid change but i guess since most ppl denied any counterplay to daze mantra existing, you can just delete stuff ppl do not utilize in this casual game out of ignorance anyway. also anet missed that mesmer was already forced to use all charges and just recharge since 24 secs count ammo recharge is way to high for a short daze interrupt tool to wait for the ammo skill to come up, so the f3 cd reduction was already an unnecessary buff. and when they plan to overnerf the ammo-daze cd with current ammo recharge count of 24 secs then no one will use daze mantra/ powerblock anymore anyway. since i sure will not use an utility slot for a 24 secs cd that does nothing else than a short daze and a trait like powerblock that already has pretty situational (less permanent) trait reward than all other trait types, with way higher skill requirement/ effort for the user (interrupt-need instead simple on hit reward for even more counterplay, even more the need to interupt keyskills in keymoments and not just spam cc on autoattacks for full traitvalue like old pi or ci).

 

problem solved, game dumbed down once again. no one needs to learn the remaining tons of counterplays to interrupt gameplay, so the dumb down with the deleted counterplay from the deleted active recharge might not even matter then, when its not use anymore bc too high cd to worth taking. gg long live pve! back to stealthspam oneshot for power mes i guess. condi spam builds can deal with that since they will get even easier to play and even more spammy when they go away from mantra/ powerblock after patch goes live. since the interrupt part was what made helseths condi rupt build at least semi interesting and semi skillful to play. big meeeeh 😞

Edited May 1, 2021 by JazzXman.7018

[Quadox.7834]

3 hours ago, JazzXman.7018 said:

4 hours ago, Quadox.7834 said:

 

i just saw its just the new forum format looking weird. you cant rly see what is a quote and what is the own post anymore (at least in your last post and when you quote a quote of a quote).

I see what you mean, there is no quote block around what i quoted from you, there might be some bug with quotes-within-quotes in the new forum layout.

[JazzXman.7018]

1 hour ago, Quadox.7834 said:

I see what you mean, there is no quote block around what i quoted from you, there might be some bug with quotes-within-quotes in the new forum layout.

prob need to use the multi quote button? me just testing here

[JazzXman.7018]

hm no clue

[aymnad.9023]

Hello @Jazzman.7135

 

I will try to answer in this thread instead of Is it just me, or mesmer is completely overpowered? Answers from non-mesmer players please. - Player vs. Player - Guild Wars 2 Forums. 

 

@Quadox.7834

I think the comparison with fighting games is unfair. In a fighting game you are not bound to your cds. You can try the same attack again after the animation, you can block, backdash or even counter attack. In gw2 if my block is still on 15s I cannot defend. An other thing that makes the fighting game analogy incorrect is that most of those games probably do not have a healing skill. It means the pace of the combat is decided by the mesmer because he decides if you can heal or not while it does not carry an handicap as big.

 

On 5/4/2021 at 2:14 PM, JazzXman.7018 said:

you have a lot of drawbacks, i explained them in the powerblock bug thread, in case you are interested in them 

Latency and reaction time are important but they apply to anything.

I do not interrupt most of the 0.5s cast skills unless I have an idea of the timing (and it still is mostly a guess). But most heal skills are around 0.75. This small additional fraction makes a difference and I am way more consistent getting it. It does not feel good at all to have to wait for the mesmer to charge his mantra to be able to heal. In theory he could still have the F3 while charging the mantra which means you are still bound to the mesmer success or failure.

 

F3 is an instant cc but I find it fine because it is limited by both the range (far is random with clones and close is great) and the cd.

 

For me stability and los are the true counters. I find it better to try to use the heal as soon as possible if I cannot back it up with stab or I will not have a way to hide / do not want to leave the node. I might as well take a 5s cd (in general) and have a chance to use it later rather than gambling if I can get it and wait too long. 

 

Quote

esp the mantra format was great for skills you want to be or which need to be instant, the active recharge adds more counterplay other instant skills like meditations on guard, fa ele air burst and warrior shouts and all other castskills in the game  dont have (sadly they will remove that, stupid as it is).

I am not sure why you mentioned those professions skills. Instant damage skills and traits have been nerfed for this very reason, they are instant and thus you cannot react. Instant defense skills got some number tweaks (cds or values) when they were used too often. But yes I hated getting  os without a warning by the old fresh air elementalist. While they still do exist they are not as tanky as before and most of the time warn you with a cc.

 

Quote

powerblock and mantra being only a short daze with low impact without interrupt then adds the interupt need (and even more the need to interrupt keyskills in keymoments not just random rupt autoattacks like old pi or old ci for decent value) what adds even more countrplay which other on hit reward skills/ traits dont have (for that they are reactive dodgeable but you cannot perma cover yourself vs them while you can temporary cover your important skills like heal vs interupts in several ways) and as said the other drawbacks i mentioned in the other thread.

 

mes only has f3 and mantra as interupt focused cc. everything else is casttime cc not able to reactive interrupt average casttime skills of 3/4 secs casts (can rupt on expectation/ guess/ prediction, so ofc when ppl play super predictable and emergency heal last moment then pistol will do the job wit the healrupt prob) and also have way more value on hit already (thats why they have a casttime, they are hard cc highly rewarding on hit already, not on interrupt only) and while torch phantasm has an insane window and easy counterplay by just moving (same for sword ambushes btw), pistol is indeed broken with the short casttime and bad visible animation for an overly long hard lock down cc stun of 2 secs on a burstclass with oneshot potential. but as said pistol still is not an interrupt cc but should get a bit longer cast time and better animation. so you have 2 dazes with currently 18,25 secs (if you pressure or interrupt the mes he maybe even cant get a recharge of the mantra for a bit longer) and f3 with 38 secs cd (32 traited). that is not an high amount for a trait (pb)/ skill (mantra) with such situational (less permanent) impact with higher skill requirement compared to on hit reward traits/ skills from the need to interupt (esp interupt keyskills in keymoments). 

 

also dont mix condimes balance issues with interupt/ powerblock stuff. there is stuff like axe 3 (completely overloaded skill, double defense with detarget and dodge, reduced skill cap by porting clones to the target so no need for skillful and on purpose clone positioning, very good dmg and that all on pretty low cd), broken pistol (es already explained) and signet of illusion what needs to be reworked or at least should lose the f4 reset since it does nothing else than breaking cd balance from strong instant shatters and providing shatterspam and lower punishment for shatterwatses. if those stuff would finally get attention by anet powerblock/ mantra would also be no problem on this build, just as it is no problem on power mes. even more powrblock/ mantra is what adds a bit skill to the condi spam and with that makes it semi intersting to play at least for a while for me as a challenge player. 

I agree with most of this section.

 

 I was not talking about the mantra alone but the full rotation with all the skills you mention after (mantra, weapon 5, F3, mantra, other weapon 5 and maybe something else). If everything adds up you have at least 2s for the mantra, 1 s for the weapon and 0.5-1 for the F3. Thanks to the healing skills cast time you can add a small delay and reach at least 5s where someone cannot heal and barely attack even if you miss. This is a long time in a 1V1 and an eternity when there is another opponent focusing you. I would love to not take condi into account but when it is the most common thing you see it is hard to do 😕

 

Actually I think power block is not great for the game for the cd increase and the icd. I find it wrong to reward what is possibly a random cc with such a huge time lock on skills and not give a full control of when it procs. To reward a skillful interrupt you would have needed to tie this effect to a single skill, quick to use and with a decent cd. If I had to choose power block feels like it should have worked like impairing daggers on the mantra. I also like the cd increase between charge use you suggest in this thread. 

 

On a side note : How do you avoid the sword one ? Sometimes it hits sometimes it doesn’t but I did not figure it out (outside of people just running away from the fight).

 

Quote

also that you get interrupts (even on heals) that easy atm is just bc lot of ppl just refuse to accept and learn the counterplay. like me, i know the interactions from both sides of the fight (means when playing vs powerblock mesmers also on other classes than my power mes, ranked and ats) and i have no problem to counterplay powerblock/ mantra from mesmers of any skill lvl and that even in outnumbered situations or when a pb mesmer tries to +1 me.  

 

for a trait like powerblock mantra needs to be as it is currently and you cannot compare to headshot on thief who has a way stronger instant class mechanic doesnt need setups and class resources before use and thief doesnt have such highly situational and high skill cap interrupt traits like powerblock (and only has a powerblock light version on one utility for good reasons).

 

so in context of the basic class mechanics and its strengths and weaknesses mantra is totally balanced as it is (as long as anet balance interupt traits around that instant interrutp tool, and ineptitude and maybe ve are the only triats left could cause problems wit that, old lost time gone, old ci gone, old confounding with stun on each daze gone, powerblock is perfectly designed already with mantra in mind since pb needs a precision tool and casttime hard cc can not give mes that) 

I only started playing mesmer (specifically chrono which is even more cc heavy) in ranked this season. I really love using cc as a support vs some professions. I can save allies from channeled abilities (like ranger lb) or interrupt supports trying to save someone (like scourge rez), all those times feel right. On the other hand most players (including myself) would probably rather have to face a profession with 2 skills with 2 of cc and a long cd than something with 4 skills with a short cc because it is easier to deal with it. With a longer cc you can chose to take it, get damaged and be safe to heal later or use your stunbreak and try to heal immediately hoping you will trade 1 stunbreak for 1cc. This is an example of what I meant when I said I have mixt feelings about the profession.

 

Edited May 7, 2021 by aymnad.9023

[JazzXman.7018]

@aymnad.9023 not too much time anymore atm but in short:

1. other on hit reward skills are less handicapped by latency and human reaction time since they dont need to interrupt for most of their value.

 

2. ofc you cannot fully compare those different gametypes but the messages from quadox still make sense and fit to gw2 to the extent quadox was meaning it

 

3. its not only the mesmer deciding, its you deciding if you counterplay it well or not. a lucky random rupt on heal can happen but only vs bad ppl dont even try to cover their heal. and luck bad players always can have with any type of skill/ trait reward, with mantra/pb it is even way more unlikely to happen than with every other skill/ traitreward in the game.

 

4. a short daze is also way less impact than a stun, that is why it can be instant.and i mentioned the other instant and not-instant skills bc they dont have a long active recharge as additional counter like current mantras have,  while they also dont need an interrupt for near max value so they also miss some other counterplay mantra/ interupt traits have (most of all pb which needs interupt on keyskills in keymoments for good impact, not like old ci random rupt on autoattack for a killermove or like current ineptitude interrupt whatever for full trait value).

 

5. stuns, knockdown etc, like mes pistol/ focus are not interrupt centered ccs, they are lock down ccs, so they have a different main purpose and are way higher value without the need to interupt and way stronger on simple hit (thats why they need to have a casttime). also they have a 100% save counter with instant stow or dodge to prevent interupt trait procs to 100%. they are not interupt focused ccs. interupts with them can happen, but they are either lucky random or too inconsistent precasted on guess/ expectation only predictable playing ppl enable and would not worth taking an interupt trait which is as tactical and high situational as powerblock. interrupt focused cc is only short (1 secs or less) soft cc (daze). all other skills are hard lock down cc with pin down focus to hit follow up dmg. interrupt tools on mes you only have mantra and f3, what is not an oppressive amount. sword ambush and torch are just dazes hidden behind longer casttimes bc the skills also include dmg (+clone generation on sword ambush) . so the daze is short enough to be instant but the skill does also other things to deserve  a casttime, and bc of the castime they also cannot reactive interrupt on purpose with around 0,5 secs-5 years (torch phant lol) casttime delay on cc in addition to latency +human reaction time. but you can still use them precasted when you predict a specific skill use from your target if your target is not aware enough to just instant stow/ dodge before the cc even start after the cast delay to prevent the interrupt-trait-reward proc save.

 

6. sword ambuhes is bugging often so even when it should hit it sometimes doesnt, so your random feeling about your own ambush not hitting is right. anet prob will never fix it since its not helping mes. find a bug that buffs mesmer and it will be hotfixed in under a week while other class buffing bugs (like ele mistform glyphress) stay in the game for months, no bias to see here /s, sry for the rant.  as an opponent (playing vs a mesmer) you can on purpose outmove sword ambush (mesmers own and clones) by side stepping at right moment or running into the leap direction and crossing the clone/ mesmer (even better with swiftness up) or running out of the leap range. which of those 3 is the best is depending on yours and clones/ mesmers position at start of the leap (distance etc).

 

7. if you are tired of reading my essays (what i can understand very well dw lol): i just added a vid link with stuff from helseth stream where he is talking about pb into the other thread about "how op is mesmer really". for sure more entertaining to listen to than to my dry analyses.

Edited May 11, 2021 by JazzXman.7018