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Waci, out of curiosity do you raid on Mesmer and/or are you planning to write up raid Mesmer in your stuff? If so I'll leave that to you because you know Mesmer much better than I do (it's obvious from your fantastic traits post). If not I'll work on a post about the meta for chronos in raiding.
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Jul 6, 2016 18:17
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Yeah, it's clear to me that I heavily underestimated the amount of effort it takes to be a mesmer in raiding, so all of this really helps.
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Jul 6, 2016 18:20
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Mesmer is weird in that it's pretty chill outside of when you're pushing Quickness in Continuum Split, and then when you're pushing Quickness every moment is important because you need your skills to line up nearly perfectly to cram them all into a Continuum Split. And the last one you'll use (Signet of Inspiration) is also one of the most important to make sure you get in there, so if you don't fit them all in there you lose a lot of Quickness cause not getting that second Signet of Inspiration off reduces how much Quickness you spit out by like 30-40%. E: Actually I'm just gonna work on some raid Mesmer stuff, I'd love to compare notes with other people and get feedback on my understanding of things cause my Chrono play still needs a lot of work. Magres fucked around with this message at 18:29 on Jul 6, 2016 |
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Jul 6, 2016 18:25
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Magres posted:Waci, out of curiosity do you raid on Mesmer and/or are you planning to write up raid Mesmer in your stuff? If so I'll leave that to you because you know Mesmer much better than I do (it's obvious from your fantastic traits post). If not I'll work on a post about the meta for chronos in raiding. I raid mostly on my mesmer and my druid, and do pretty much everything else on my mesmer as well. I was thinking of doing a skill/weapon writeup first before specific builds, so go ahead. I'll do some pvp mesmer builds or something when I get there and just comment on yours if I see something to add?
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Jul 6, 2016 18:39
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Waci posted:I raid mostly on my mesmer and my druid, and do pretty much everything else on my mesmer as well. I was thinking of doing a skill/weapon writeup first before specific builds, so go ahead. I'll do some pvp mesmer builds or something when I get there and just comment on yours if I see something to add? Sounds great!
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Jul 6, 2016 18:51
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*from wvw roaming experience* I personally do not think you need any healing gear for a druid. Mainly thanks to the minor trait that gives you 2% x 10 stacks of outgoing healing power (which is always maxed thanks to regen). That lets you gear up with more important stats like toughness and whatever damage output of your choice. I have never died and gone "man i would have survived if only i had a few hundred points of healing". Druid healing is ridiculously strong baseline, I find it to be inefficient for your group to gimp damage or survivability for a small gain in healing. treizebee fucked around with this message at 19:38 on Jul 6, 2016 |
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Jul 6, 2016 19:33
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The exception being raids, because if your group isn't on the ball you may actually need that extra healing, your contribution to DPS comes from buffing others, not your own, and you can't bring toughness anyway. Magis is good raid druid gear if your group ever needs the bit of extra healing over berserkers.
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Jul 6, 2016 19:36
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if i remember correctly (i haven't played this game in a while) my only healing stats were on my staff and one or two pieces of jewelry. mainly for extra sustain against HoT mobs.
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Jul 6, 2016 19:37
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Waci posted:Effortpost goodness This stuff is great and the idea of raiding on a mesmer sounds hella cool.
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Jul 6, 2016 21:10
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Mesmers, Raiding, and You! Something something time traveling and illusions shutup I can't think of a clever tagline right now I'll mostly be calling Mesmers "Chronos," shorthand for Chronomancer, their Elite Specialization that everyone always uses in every raid ever, because there's no reason to ever not use it. Chronos' job in raids is mostly to get as much Quickness and Alacrity onto their teammates as possible. Quickness makes people cast abilities 50% faster, and Alacrity makes their abilities recharge 33% faster (if someone has permanent Alacrity, their abilities will take 75% as long to recharge as they would without Alacrity). Doing a good job of pushing out tons of Quickness and Alacrity can increase your group's overall DPS by something like 30%, so it's a huge boost to your group's damage. Build There's actually a plethora of choices to be made when building a Chrono, so we'll start with the stuff that's fairly stable. Weapons - Your weapon sets will be Sword/Shield and either Empty/Sword or Empty/Focus. Your mainhand slot in your second set remains empty so you can use your mainhand Sword in both sets. This is because you'll want a rather expensive Superior Sigil of Concentration (46g as of my writing this) in that sword. It gives you a big pile of Boon Duration (making your Quickness last longer) every time you swap weapons. You can, in theory, do Sword/Shield and Sword/(Sword or Focus) and have two Sigils of Concentration if you're rich and want to, but it's a waste of money. I generally run X/Focus because the 4 skill on Focus has an extremely good pull that is incredibly useful in a variety of situations, but for Matthias you essentially have to run Sword. Sword gives you better Illusion generation once you get good at it, because its 4 skill pops out a Clone when you block with it, and its 5 skill generates a Phantasm, where Focus only generates a Phantasm on its 5 skill. User preference! Armor - you have two basic setups, Berserker or Commander. Commander armor is a more involved build that means you'll always be tanking and will deal even crappier damage, but also means you don't need a Revenant to hit 100% Boon Duration. (Sidenote, Revenants and Chronomancers are often paired together because Rev can hand out 50% boon duration). Commander armor is also a huge pain in the rear end to make and not really worth it (imo) so I'll be focusing on the Berserker setup. You'll want full Berserker armor with 6 Superior Runes of the Chronomancer in it. The 6th thing on Chrono runes helps you spit out extra Quickness. Trinkets - depends on whether you're tanking or not. If you're tanking, run enough Toughness to break 1400 Toughness and whatever you want past that, otherwise run full Berserker. Traits - things get a little more contentious here. My quick summary default setting is Chronomancer 333, Inspiration 122, and Illusions 222. Domination instead of Illusions is also viable I prefer Illusions to Domination, but take your pick. Illusions works around a 2 quickness push cycle where you'll do a Continuum Split (CS) push, then a non-CS push, then a CS push, etc etc. Domination does a 3 quickness push cycle where you do a CS push then two non-CS pushes. For Inspiration, all three traits can change, but I prefer 122. Some people like Persisting Images for the first trait, but I think Medic's Feedback is significantly better (faster revives, protective bubble when reviving). Second trait is between Warden's Feedback and Restorative Illusions. Warden's Feedback is very important for specific fights (ie Slothasor) for the reflect on focus skills, but outside of that I run Restorative Illusions because extra healing is very good. For the third trait, some people like Mental Defense because the Phantasmal Defender can help you stay alive longer, but in my opinion Illusionary Inspiration is much better, because having an extra Signet of Inspiration to proc can let you push out a lot of extra Quickness if you do it right. Finally, I run 222 for Illusions. I like Illusions because it reduces your Phantasm and Illusion summoning cooldowns, as well as the cooldown of all your shatter skills. Skills - almost always the same, but there are a couple variations. For starters, you will always run Well of Action (aka Quickness well) and Signet of Inspiration in your utilities, and Time Warp for your elite. After that, you can pick between Signet of the Ether (healing signet) and Well of Eternity (healing well) for your heal skill. The Signet of the Ether is a little easier to play, Well of Eternity lets you push more Quickness. I highly recommend Healing Well, personally. For your third utility slot you want to run Well of Recall (aka Alacrity well) unless you need Feedback (used for Slothasor and Matthias). Food - any 20% boon duration food, and your maintenance item is whatever you feel like, really, though I use Superior Sharpening Stones. Rotation(s) I'm going to be assuming anyone reading this is running the Illusions build, cause the Domination rotation is different. For a quick guide to the Domination rotation, watch the youtube video of it on qT's Raid Chrono build guide. Additionally, there are two actual rotations, depending on Continuum Split vs non Continuum Split, and I'll be talking about them separately. Continuum Split Rotation - If starting in Sword/X (ie not Sword/Shield), it'll be Weapon Swap, Continuum Split, Time Warp, Well of Action, Well of Recall, Well of Eternity, Tides of Time (ie Shield 5), Signet of Inspiration. You want to buffer cast them all (ie hit the next skill while the current one is casting so the next one starts casting the moment the current one ends) because you don't have the time to spare to mess around with waiting for reaction time and latency. One way to buy yourself a little bit of spare time is to Continuum Split while casting Time Warp. CS has no cast time and can be used mid cast, and if you pop it during the Time Warp cast you can buy yourself an extra ~0.15 seconds to get your rotation off, and it actually matters sometimes. Just be careful and make sure you actually pop CS before Time Warp finishes, or you've just blown a 180s cooldown you didn't need to blow. For the CS rotation, your goal is to have 3 illusions out and be sitting on Sword/X (ie not Sword/Shield), so you can swap to Sword/Shield to proc your Sigil of Concentration before starting the rotation. If you only have two illusions out and everything's on cooldown though, you can switch to Shield, use your 4 skill, then begin the rotation and you'll have enough time before Sigil of Concetration's effect ends. As a side note to the rotation, if you find yourself stuck in Sword/Shield when you're wanting to pop out a CS rotation, you can do Continuum Split, Tides of Time, Weapon Swap, Time Warp, Well of Action, Well of Recall, Signet of Inspiration. You have to skip something to make time for the Weapon Swap, and Well of Recall is a more important Well to double up on than Well of Eternity. Additionally, at the end of your rotation you want to immediately drop into your non-Continuum Split Rotation as soon as possible, because all of your Quickness skills come back up as soon as Continuum Split ends. Non-Continuum Split Rotation - Starting in Sword/X, Weapon Swap, Well of Action, Well of Recall, Well of Eternity, Tides of Time, Signet of Inspiration, Phantasm Skill. Don't use Time Warp! Only use Time Warp during CS pushes so you can turn that 3 minute cooldown into a 76.5 second cooldown. If you're starting in Sword/Shield, your rotation will be Tides of Time, Weapon Swap, Well of Recall, Well of Action, Well of Eternity, Signet of Inspiration, Phantasm Skill. For clarity, by Phantasm Skill I mean either Shield 4, Focus 5, or Sword 5. You have a 30s cooldown trait that procs Signet of Inspiration when you summon a Phantasm, and managing it properly (ie lining it up with your non-CS rotations) will let you push a ton of extra quickness (like 40% more). Regarding skill order, it's not super important as long as Time Warp and Well of Action are early and Signet of Inspiration is last. Time Warp and Well of Action both take a while to put Quickness on you and you want to give them as much time to work their mojo on you as you can before sharing the Quickness. Signet of Inspiration goes last because it doubles up everything you've already done, and putting it last lets you double up more stuff. Outside of pushing quickness - spam illusions, shatter them for quickness. Use abilities, don't die! For tanking, use your dodge rolls, Sword 2, Shield 4, and Sword 4 (if you have it) to mitigate damage. Just keep an eye on your cooldowns for your wells and CS and plan accordingly - when your Wells are getting to ~15 seconds left on cooldown, switch to Sword/X to be to Weapon Swap to Sword/Shield when appropriate, and when CS is getting low on cooldown try to crank out some illusions to be ready for it to come up. Learning to do this nonsense I highly recommend not starting tanking unless you've already tanked a lot on other classes and are extremely comfortable with the bosses. Chrono rotations take a lot of focus until you've done them for a while, and so does tanking, and trying to do them both at the same time means you'll probably wind up screwing both of them up a lot. For boss specific advice, read boss guides! If anyone has boss specific questions I'll try to answer them, but I'm not a terribly good tank. A drill you can do to just get used to how pumping quickness feels and playing that fast for bursts of time is to walk up to a random person and do the following rotation, with no illusions at all: Time Warp, Chrono Split during Time Warp, Well of Action, Chrono Split Ends, Well of Action (again), Well of Recall, Well of Eternity, Tides of Time, Echo of Memory (Shield 4, it spawns a phantasm and triggers your traited Signet of Inspiration), wait a second or two, Signet of Inspiration. The reason to wait for the second Signet of Inspiration is because, on the back end of GW2, even though Quickness stacks in duration it actually keeps track of your stacks of quickness. I don't know all the details, but from what I understand you can only have 9 stacks of Quickness at a time, and by waiting a couple seconds to recast Signet of Inspiration you let a couple of them expire and then refill those slots with more, longer duration stacks. Beyond that, go play Chrono in the open world stuff out there and try to pump quickness out onto people, and play fractals and pump quickness. I adore a good chrono in fractal groups because having quickness and alacrity is really fun. E: Oh, a note on Keybindings. Playing with default keybindings makes Chrono more or less impossible to play well. Your rotation has to be fast enough to make it fit that the time it takes to move your hand across the keyboard to hit 6-0 actually matters, a lot. I'd say it's more or less impossible to do a good CS split on default keybindings while also handling boss mechanics. Everyone has their own setup so if you have your own customized keybinds that let you reach all your stuff comfortable, carry on. If you use default keybindings, PLEASE redo them or you're pretty much crippling your ability to play Chrono well (and, imo, default keybindings are just really unpleasant because not having your heal and utilities and elite within easy reach sucks). My setup for keybindings is as follows: Movement keys: WASD (forward, back, and strafe side to side) Turning character: hold right click and move the mouse Weapon Skills, 1-5 changed to QERFZ Heal Skill, 6 changed to X Utilities, 7-9 changed to CVT Elite, 0 changed to G Profession Skills, F1-F5 changed to 1-5 Dodge: Mouse 4 (rear thumb button) Weapon Swap: Mouse 5 (forward thumb button) Special Action: Tilde (~ key, left of 1) You can definitely make due without a 5 button mouse, but it does make life easier. Without mine I'd do something like Ctrl for Dodge and Mouse 3 (middle mouse button) for weapon swap. If you don't have a 5 button mouse and want one, I use the Logitech MX518 and love it because it's the only mouse big enough for my enormous hands, and my fiance uses the Anker Gaming Mouse and really likes it, though I'm not a fan of its thumb buttons. Magres fucked around with this message at 21:58 on Jul 6, 2016 |
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Jul 6, 2016 21:26
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Note that in addition to giving you a little more of that ever-precious alacrity, the healing well also has built-in condi clear (holy poo poo vital in wing 2), and is an AoE heal instead of healing just yourself. It wont make you a druid, but every bit helps. I would also say that even for Slothasor, you should only replace the alacrity well with Feedback if you're noticeably lacking in reflects from guardians. Both guardians and mesmers can reflect, only mesmers can hand out alacrity. Maintenance item should be bountiful sharpening stone if you can at all afford them (at something like 70s each last time I mathed). Your personal DPS isn't that relevant on a raid scale compared to the group DPS boost from your boons, and you'll get better DPS anyway by using boon duration consumables and DPS gear than the other way around. I'd recommend starting your CS rotation with Well of Recall (remember Alacrity isn't a boon, so losing the weapon swap bonus for that one skill doesn't matter) and using CS right before the casting time for it is finished, since it has a longer casting time than Time Warp and you have a smaller risk of lag loving things up, as well as using the shorter skill during your precious few CS seconds and the longer one outside of them. Like Magres pointed out, you should pay attention to your signet of inspiration from Illusionary Inspiration. As I said, your DPS doesn't matter anywhere near as much as your buffs, so just stick to clones for shatter fuel between rotations. I'd also like to add a point about paying attention to WHEN you use your buff rotations. If your CS rotation comes up right when VG is about to split or a breakbar phase in any fight is about to come up, it's better to wait a couple of seconds and use it when the group is back at DPSing. Even more importantly, pay attention to when the group needs to move (e.g. running for the walls on Gorseval or avoiding Sabetha's flame wall, right as a boss is about to die on bandit trio, dodging ghosts on keep construct). Delaying your CS rotation by 5 seconds sucks, but using it right when the group needs to move and wasting it completely sucks even more. You can also reach 100% boon duration with only partial commander's gear (the trinkets are much easier to get than the actual armour, though you'll need a couple of pieces of armour as well. I recommend the pick-your-stats raid loot you can buy with magnetite shards), but realistically, you usually want to bring a revenant anyway since they can do other things as well in addition tot he boon duration so there's really no reason to go for 100% boon duration instead of 50% other than "because I can" cred (consumables should give you 30%, so get a couple commander's jewels or a piece of armour or two to bump it up to 50% if you want to raid chrono regularly). Also, non class specific advice for everyone: bind a key to about-face. Do not be the guy who RP walks out of the red circles. Waci fucked around with this message at 22:08 on Jul 6, 2016 |
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Jul 6, 2016 22:00
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I don't run Bountiful Sharpening Stones cause with a Rev, a Sigil of Concentration, and 20% Boon Food you're already at 100% Boon Duration. Well of Recall first for CS Split is interesting , I'll have to try that. I think I like it a lot better than Time Warp first. You might lose a shred of Quickness from not putting Time Warp first, but it should make the rotation a lot easier and more reliable. Magres fucked around with this message at 22:31 on Jul 6, 2016 |
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Jul 6, 2016 22:05
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You lose about a second of quickness, but I find the extra leeway during CS worth it especially since I play with a less than perfect connection. It also buys you enough extra time that if you need to, you can dodge int he middle of your rotation and still get everything important off in time. I don't like relying on the sigil for boon duration because it limits what else you can do with your weapons by making weapon swap a part of your rotation. Sucks if you're relying on shield to survive or using focus for reflects or pulls. I think that might be a stylistic difference though, I like dumping my CS rotation and non-CS rotation right after each other (ie before weapon swap comes off cooldown) to make sure as much of the buffs as possible is around during DPS phases, but that might just be me being weird about the sigil. Not needing the sigil as a part of your rotation also lets you swap to a ranged weapon if you need to, which depending on group may or may not be useful for some fights. Still though, good point that if you're aiming for 50% by yourself you can do it with the sigil if you pay attention to it. Waci fucked around with this message at 22:38 on Jul 6, 2016 |
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Jul 6, 2016 22:20
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I still quite like how my Reaper turned out.
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Jul 6, 2016 22:42
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Waci posted:You lose about a second of quickness, but I find the extra leeway during CS worth it especially since I play with a less than perfect connection. It also buys you enough extra time that if you need to, you can dodge int he middle of your rotation and still get everything important off in time. Sigil juggling can definitely be a huge pain in the rear end! I'm just too lazy to put together Commander gear  E: Other general non-class specific advice (sort of) for the thread, in addition to strongly agreeing with Waci about bind an about face key, is to change Ground Targeting method to Fast with Range Indicator. It's a really good compromise between Normal and Instant. Normal is "press ability, click mouse to cast ability," Instant is "ability casts wherever your mouse is as soon as you press the key" and Fast with Range Indicator is "press key, move mouse to pick area, release key to cast ability." It still gives you the ability to check ranges, but also lets you play faster more easily. It particularly matters on Chrono during CS, though it'll help you play quickly on any class. I just changed my Ground Targeting option and I can already really, really tell how much easier it is to do my Continuum Split rotation. Magres fucked around with this message at 23:03 on Jul 6, 2016 |
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Jul 6, 2016 22:57
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Poops Mcgoots posted:I still quite like how my Reaper turned out. Nice! If I had to make one comment, do you think the green glowing eyes might match the other dyes more closely, or is it simply just too green compared to the bluer shades of the armour? Compromise is the worst part of princessing, really.
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Jul 6, 2016 23:07
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Ok, next part of my series of pointless effortposts about mesmer mechanics: weapon skills. Next up Book of Mesmer - Chapter 3: Weapons Sword (main hand) By far the most popular mesmer weapon due to relatively high DPS, a great evasion skill, and boon strip on autoattack. Used in in more builds than not, including (nearly) all power builds. Melee attacks with a short-range gap closer. Relevant trait is Fencer’s Finesse from the Dueling line. Mind Slash/Gash/Spike: The autoattack chain. Each step can hit up to 3 targets. The first two apply vulnerability and some damage, the third one does larger damage and strips one boon. The damage increases slightly if the target has no boons. Blurred Frenzy: A 2.5s channel that deals heavy damage in melee, and during which you evade all attacks. Note that unlike Distortion this is evasion rather than invulnerability, and thus unblockable attacks such as Dragonhunter pulls, retaliation, and certain raid boss attacks still affect you. Illusionary Leap: A triple-purpose clone generator, gap closer, and immobilise. When you use the skill, you create a clone at your target and cripple them. When you use the chain skill, you swap places with your clone and immobilise enemies in melee range of where you end up. The swap (not the initial use) is also a leap finisher. A standard starter for your burst in many builds for the obvious reasons, and the clone creation and leap finisher make it useful mid-fight as well. Scepter A mainhand-only medium range condi weapon. Can gain increased attack speed and reduced cooldowns from Malicious Sorcery in the Illusions line. Notable for the autoattack chain spawning clones. Unlike most chain skills, you can advance in the chain without hitting a target, meaning you can in some situations set up your autoattack chain so that your first hit uses the third skill in the chain, which can be helpful for quick burst setup for condi shatter builds. Ether Bolt/Blast/Clone: The first two attacks fire projectiles that cause Torment. Note that when autoattacking, the chain wont progress until the projectile actually hits a target, meaning your attack speed slows down as your distance from the target increases. Quickness and the Malicious Sorcery trait ignore this limitation. The third skill will either spawn a clone that uses Ether bolt (only Bolt, not the whole chain) or inflict yet more Torment, depending on whether you have unused illusions slots available. Unlike the first two, the last skill in the chain is not a projectile. Illusionary Counter: 2s block channel that ends after 1 hit. If you block an attack, inflict Torment on the attacker and summon a clone that casts Ether Bolt. You can interrupt the channel to shoot a medium-range line that blinds targets in it. Confusing Images: Channel a beam between you and your target that inflicts pulsing damage and confusion on the target and others in the beam. Channel lasts for 2 seconds and hits 6 times. Greatsword Two-handed long-range weapon. The default ranged option for power builds of all kinds. Damage scales with distance, making it less than ideal to use at short range. The Imagined Burden trait from the Domination line reduces cooldowns, adds Might to Spatial Surge, and Cripple to the other four. Spatial Surge: Shoot a purple laser at your target, dealing damage that increases with distance from your target. Can hit two additional targets within the line. Mirror Blade: Throw an illusionary greatsword that bounces between enemies and allies (including yourself). Deals damage and applies vulnerability to enemies, applies might to allies. Spawns a clone at the first target. Bounces 3 times. Each bounce towards an enemy counts as a projectile finisher with a 100% success rate. The attack is unblockable. Mind Stab: Ground-targeted AoE damage skill, also strips one boon from each target hit. Note that this actually has a 0.25 second casting time, which is interrupted by movement. Phantasmal Berserker: Summons a phantasm that leaps through the target in a whirling AoE attack. The attack cripples enemies, and also counts as a whirl finisher. Because the phantasm moves during its attack, the actual damage dealt to a target varies depending on the target(s)'s position(s) and and the size of their hitboxes, varying from very high if all 4 spins hit something to not much at all if only one does. The movement is perpendicular to the line between you and the target, and covers a distance of roughly 720 units. Illusionary Wave: Deals minor damage to and knocks back enemies in a 450 unit range 90° cone in front of you. The knockback distance is one of the longest in the game (though multiple Launch skills have equal or greater range). Staff The other two-handed ranged weapon. Used to be common in PvP as a defensive weapon even in power builds, still the premier long-range option for condi builds of all kinds. The Chaotic Dampening trait reduces cooldowns and buffs Chaos Armor, which the weapon has multiple sources of. Winds of Chaos: Shoots an orb that bounces between enemies and allies (the first target is always the one you cats it at, after that it will bounce to the closest enemy or ally) for 2 bounces. Allies randomly gain fury or might, enemies randomly gain bleeding, burning, or vulnerability. Note the range of the bounce is based on the previously touched target rather than on you, meaning as long as the first target is within 1200 units of you, consecutive bounces can reach targets that would normally be out of range. Phase Retreat: Teleport away from your target for 400 units and summon a clone that casts Winds of Chaos. The clone is summoned at your initial position. If you have an enemy targeted, you teleport directly away from the target. If you have no target, you teleport backwards base don your characters facing. If you use staff, I recommend binding a key for 180° turn to allow you to easily switch your characters facing. Note that like most teleport skills, this can allow you to travel over certain ledges, which can be useful particularly in sPvP. Phantasmal Warlock: Summons an illusion that attacks one target and deals damage depending on the number of conditions on the target. With no or very few conditions, the damage is quite low, noticeably behind other phantasms, but can scale to be very high. Note that the warlock’s projectiles travel along the ground, meaning they will be stopped by unwalkable ledges or gaps unlike most projectiles. Chaos Armour: You gain Chaos Armor for 5 seconds. The aura gained is identical to the one gained from an ethereal field+leap/blast combo, but the aura is a good defensive buff. You gain a random boon from protection, regeneration, or swiftness every second, and each time an enemy hits you, they gain a random condition from weakness, confusion, and cripple. Chaos Storm: Ground-targeted AoE that persists for 5s. Each second, enemies within the AoE take a small amount of damage, and gain a random one of chilled, poison, weakness, and daze. Allies within the field gain a random boon from aegis, retaliation, and swiftness each second. The AoE is also an ethereal combo field, meaning it can serve as a source of chaos armour when combined with the leap finisher from Phase Retreat. Sword (offhand) A popular offhand choice in PvE, especially for power phantasm builds due to the excellent phantasm. Benefits from Fencer’s Finesse just like the mainhand version. Illusionary Riposte: 2.5s channeled block that ends on the first hit. When you get hit, you deal a moderate amount of damage and summon a clone. During the channel, you can use a chain skill to end the channel early (ie before blocking the single attack) to shoot a medium-range line towards your target that dazes enemies hit by it for 1s. Note that when you block, you also teleport a very short distance in a random direction (you’ll be in melee range of where you were before), which can be worth remembering if you’re in a place where your positioning is very precise, like standing in a small gap between red circles. Phantasmal Swordsman: Summon a phantasm that hits your target with a sword. Counts as a leap finisher on you when you use the skill and on the phantasm when it attacks. Generally the highest-DPS phantasm (exceptions apply due to certain other phantasms’ damage scaling off various things that aren’t easy to standardise). Focus Off-hand only utility weapon, with an AoE pull and an anti-projectile dome. The Warden’s Feedback trait from Inspiration makes both skills reflect projectiles. Temporal Curtain: A line-shaped ground-targeted AoE that grants swiftness to allies and cripples enemies. Is also a light combo field. One second after casting, you can use a chain skill to end the effect, pulling enemies within 600 units of the field’s centre towards it. Pulled enemies always travel the same distance (450 units), regardless of their distance from the centre, meaning you can pull enemies past the line if they’re close enough to it when you do so. Excellent for pulling people off cliffs or walls in WvW, one of mesmer’s precious few sources of swiftness. Note that while the curtain’s cripple and swiftness have no limit on the number of targets, the pull can only affect a maximum of 5. Phantasmal Warden: Summons a phantasm that does a stationary whirling attack with 12 attacks over 5 seconds, with max 3 targets. Every attack counts as a whirl finisher. Good damage if all 12 attacks hit. The attack also destroys projectiles that pass through its AoE (unless Warden’s Feedback is active, in which case they’re reflected instead) . Pistol Long-range offhand, with a bouncing hard CC skill and a good condi damage phantasm. Used to be used for condi phantasm builds and occasionally for interrupt-heavy gimmicks. Now uncommon due to bugged damage on the phantasm. Duelist’s Discipline from the Dueling line causes both your and the phantasm’s pistol attacks to have a chance of causing bleeding, and causes interrupts to partially recharge your pistol skills. Phantasmal Duelist: Summons a phantasm that attacks 8 times. The damage in itself is decent, made better by combining the large number of attacks with Duelist’s Discipline and Sharper Images in condi phantasm builds. Currently out of fashion due to bugged damage scaling. Magic Bullet: A bouncing projectile attack that stuns the first target (2s), dazes the second (2s), blinds the third (5s), and confuses the fourth (5s, 1 stack). Is also a projectile finisher. Torch The offhand weapon for stealth and condi builds, and reasonable common especially in sPvP and WvW roaming for other builds as well due to having stealth on a weapon skill. The Illusions trait The Pledge causes both skills to remove conditions and to recharge faster while in stealth. The Prestige: Blind enemies around you in an AoE and stealth for 3s. When the stealth ends, deal moderate damage and inflict burning on enemies around you. The end of stealth is also a blast finisher, the only one that mesmers have. Note that the damage at the end of stealth technically occurs before the stealth ends, causing you to get the Revealed effect if an enemy is within range to be damaged by it. Phantasmal Mage: Creates a phantasm that uses a bouncing attack that inflicts burning on enemies and grants fury to allies. All around decent damage phantasm, current standard for condi phantasm builds alongside Phantasmal Warlock due to not being bugged like Phantasmal Duelist. Shield Chronomancer only offhand, with a very good block skill, a phantasm that grants alacrity and slows enemies, and an AoE stun and quickness. Has no weapon-specific trait outside the one that unlocks its use. Common for builds of all kinds across all game modes. Echo of Memory: 1.5s block channel. Unlike other mesmer weapon blocks, this one does not end after the first blocked hit. Instead, if the skill is allowed to channel for its entire duration, summon a phantasm that grants alacrity to allies and applies slow to enemies (both 2s every ~8s, in an AoE around the target). If the skill blocks an attack, an identical chain skill becomes available for 10 seconds, allowing you to effectively use the skill again before the cooldown starts. Tides of Time: Launches a small moving AoE towards the enemy, which grants quickness to allies it touches and stuns enemies. The AoE travels 600 metres, and then returns to you, having the same effects on the way back. Touching the returning AoE reduces the skill’s cooldown by 10s. Note that targets blocking the skill or colliding with impassable environment cause the skill to end immediately, without turning back. One of the few AoE hard CC skills without a limit on the number of targets that can be affected. Targets with very large hitboxes like many champion and legendary mobs may be hit more than once as the AoE passes through them. Is also an ethereal combo field. Waci fucked around with this message at 00:57 on Jul 7, 2016 |
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Jul 6, 2016 23:22
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Magres posted:Rev stuff Possible minor correction: Shouldn't the Glint DPS rotation include the Facet of Swiftness/Elemental Blast immediate toggle? Thing I learned: increasing DPS by rotating clockwise around the enemy while in Jalis hammers  that is awesome
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Jul 7, 2016 00:07
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who wants to carry me through a raid
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Jul 7, 2016 00:48
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SFD/GOON groups (there's like 4 regular groups now) have carried worse people than you (statement applies to everyone except Skwaffles) through most of them and raid at various times and days during both weekends and weekdays. Weekday NA time raids tend to be full because they're the most reliable for getting poo poo done, weekend EU time raids beat fewer bosses (Like, 3-6 a week instead of 6-9) but are almost certain to have space if you show up without having to have someone fetch you.
Waci fucked around with this message at 00:59 on Jul 7, 2016 |
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Jul 7, 2016 00:55
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Druid stuff holy poo poo this took a long time and i don't even play this game anymore but WHO CARES HERE WE GO Posting the build again: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vNAQNBmODbkRFaXxWVwZFIaxCjg5M6KdxA4n6VNryUA+WBgK8cH I'm just gonna go into this assuming you just want a Support/Healbot sort of build, without worrying too much about damage. I can do a more hybrid damage/support build later if someone wants it. This is a very healing-heavy build. You've been warned. Gear This particular build is technically a condition damage build, but you can honestly get away with wearing whatever the hell you want. The only thing I'd say would be mandatory is healing stats on your staff, because healing is what the staff is for and nothing else. there's no reason to put any other stats on it. I use Minstrel's on mine, Cleric's works also. You can get a free minstrel's staff for being a druid. Armor stats, like I said, are really rather open. Vitality and toughness are good in any build for survivability, especially in HoT zones (unless they nerfed them since I last played). Healing stats are cool but not really necessary like treizebee said. I have a healing amulet for shits and giggles, and I think the rest of my stuff is either berserker's or rampager's. Weapons So this being a support build you want to have support stuff. That means Staff, and that means Horn. Personally, I like to use Axe/Horn over Sword/Horn because one is ranged and the other is not. Axe is a condition weapon, Sword is a power weapon. Axe has projectile finishers, which when thrown through a water field can spread Regeneration to your allies. Sword has a Leap finisher and an evade, which can give you more selfish survivability if you really need it. The choice is yours. I'm gonna stick with Axe. Staff: Staff is all about healing. You can do some damage with it, but it's not really worth worrying about. Let's look at the skills a bit. 1: Solar Beam. A piddly little laser beam that heals allies and damages enemies caught in the beam. If you can line up enemies you can do a decent amount of aoe damage with it but it's not gonna blow your socks off. 2: Astral Wisp. This sends out a wisp that damages your target once and sets a healing ball orbiting around them that heals allies in melee range of the target for a decent amount. Basically just use this on cooldown on whatever boss or target your group is smacking. 3: Ancestral Grace. The best staff skill. It's a fast-moving dash skill that turns you into a wisp which lets you evade all damage on your way to the targeted location. When you reach the end of the dash, you blast an aoe heal around you. The blast finisher is an important combo skill that will interact with several other abilities so keep that in mind. 4: Vine Surge. This ability is kinda weird. It sends out a line of vines that damages and immobilizes enemies, and frees allies from cripple, immobilize, and chill. It's very tricky to land properly on moving targets. However if you can land it on a clump of enemies chasing you or your friends it can slow them down rather well. 5: Sublime Conversion. This ability is awesome. It drops a small, rectangular water field line. Any enemy projectiles that pass through it are instead converted into friendly, healing projectiles. This part of the skill is tricky to pull off, it requires good timing and knowledge of what the enemy can do, so luckily instead we can just use it as a water field the rest of the time. Water fields send out an aoe heal around you when you blast inside of it (So this means Staff skill 3 and warhorn skill 5 will provide extra aoe heal bursts if you're standing inside a water field). The simplest combo for druid healing is to drop Sublime Conversion next to your ally that's about to die, then immediately Ancestral Grace dash into the field. Boom, ally healed. Twice. What's more, any water field (this also includes your Healing Spring which we'll get to in a bit) will function for this combo. Water fields also provide Regeneration to allies when you or allies shoot projectiles through it. It's free healing and you don't really have to think about it! It's great. Axe/Horn 1: Ricochet. A pretty basic autoattack skill that throws an axe that bounces between 3 targets. It also gives you Might stacks for each target hit, which will boost you (and your pet's) damage a bit. 2: Splitblade. 5 axes thrown out in front of you, each one adding one stack of Bleeding to whatever is hit. If you're stacking Condition damage, this is where a lot of your dps will come from. You want to do this from close range so that all of your axes hit the target. 3: Winter's Bite. A simple thrown axe ability that Chills the target (slowing their movement and attack speed) and causing your pet's next attack to inflict Weakness. Not too shabby. 4: Hunter's Call. Birds. They bite the target. It looks hilarious. Does good damage if you're stacking Power, but otherwise not a very remarkable skill. 5: Call of the Wild. The buff skill to end all buff skills. With the Nature Magic - Windborne Notes trait, this also gives Regeneration on top of the Might, Fury, and Swiftness. It is also your second blast ability. Stand in a water field (Staff skill 5 or Healing Spring) , toot your horn, get bonus healing. Stand in a fire field (i.e. your Fire Trap), get bonus might stacks. Is very naice. Skills Healing Spring. This is honestly probably one of the best healing skills in the game. It heals you, it heals your allies, it cleanses conditions, it provides a water field. The Skirmishing - Trapper's Expertise trait lowers the cooldown and extends the length of the regeneration. The Druid - Cultivated Synergy trait provides two more extra heals (one from you and one from your pet) when you cast it. This is the thing that will save your bacon. Fire Trap. Does good damage, even without much condition stats, and places a fire field. Fire fields provide you and your allies Might stacks when blasted. Also adds Burning to projectiles that go through it. Trapper's Expertise adds a cripple effect to enemies hit by it as well. Try to keep one down as often as possible, it has a VERY low cooldown. Your allies can also blast it to keep the might stacks flowing. Frost Spirit. I'm still upset that they took away walking spirits, but they're still pretty good buff skills for group play, especially with the Nature's Vengeance trait. Frost spirit adds damage and Might to your allies. Using the ability again kills the spirit and Chills enemies around it. Not really worth blowing it up. Sun Spirit. Grants Vigor (endurance regen, for more dodging) and Burning to your allies' attacks. Its suicide skill Blinds and Burns enemies around it. This spirit you can swap out to another skill if the need arises. (Stone Spirit for more defense, or Glyph of Empowerment for a more direct damage buff for your allies). Spirit of Nature. The big daddy spirit, it's got a long cooldown but can be powerful if used properly. If your teammates are downed and you're fast enough, you can drop the Spirit and hit the button again to command it to revive all allies instantly in an area and remove their conditions. You can even revive yourself if you give the command just before you're about to go down, as there's a small delay before the revive actually completes. It will not revive players that are fully dead. It also gives Stability to allies while it's alive (from the trait). Traits For traits you want Skirmishing, Nature Magic, and Druid. I don't want to get into SUPER detail but I'll give the general lowdown of what each trait brings to the build. Skirmishing: Minors give Swiftness and Fury when swapping weapons, and a bonus crit chance when attacking from behind. Trapper's Expertise improves your traps, which we use 2 of, and Spotter buffs your allies' Precision (we are a support, after all). Quick Draw is neat, and can work really well in this build. Luckily it's fairly easy to remember: After you swap weapons, use your 5 skill first. On both weapon sets, the 5 skills (Sublime Conversion and Call of the Wild) have the longest cooldowns. Quick Draw can let you use these extremely useful abilities much more often. Like holy poo poo you will be doing so much healing. Nature Magic: Minors give Regeneration at low hp, Boon sharing with your pet, and free +20% Boon Duration. Boons for everyone, we love boons. Allies' aid causes your pet to assist you in reviving a downed ally (not a dead ally). I forget if they nerfed this since I last played, but it lets you revive players very, very quickly. Windborne Notes adds Regen and cooldown reduction to your Call of the Wild. Nature's Vengeance buffs your Spirits and adds bonus buffs to them. Pretty simple stuff. Druid: Ah, the fun stuff. Minors give staff/glyphs/celestial avatar form, self-heals when healing allies, and a stacking healing buff for healing allies. Cultivated Synergy gives bonus heals on your Healing Spring, one from you and one from your pet. Natural Stride is awesome and every ranger should have it, it gives you free movement speed and reduced duration of slowing conditions. Grace of the Land buffs your allies' damage when you heal them with Celestial Avatar abilities. Speaking of... Celestial Avatar This is the real meat of the Druid class and will give you another source of crazy burst healing other than all the poo poo you can already do. It comes with even more skills! 1: Cosmic Ray. A small ground-targeted aoe moonfire spam that you probably don't usually need to bother to spam. It's actually rather difficult to actually hit your allies with this skill. This is what you cast when you have nothing else to cast. Or spam it between spamming your 2. 2: Seed of Life. Summons a light field that also heals allies around it after a short delay. Light fields when blasted provide Area Retaliation (thorns damage) to allies and projectiles cast through it will remove conditions from allies nearby. Nice. Spam this when your other CA abilities are on cooldown. 3. Lunar Impact. This is your big burst heal, and a big aoe Daze as well, good for breaking CC bars on bosses. I coulda swore that this was also a blast finisher but I might be wrong. Use this on cooldown. 4. Rejuvenating Tides. Your other big burst heal. This is the first ability you should use as soon as you enter Celestial Avatar. Pop this and run around as it summons a mobile water field that follows you and heals everyone around you. You can't cast anything else while channeling it, but your allies' projectiles and blasts will work off of it to grant more healing. 5. Natural Convergence. This is not a healing skill but a big aoe Cripple and Slow that ends in an Immobilize on 5 targets. It can also do a surprising amount of damage. Also looks really cool. Mainly a pvp skill tbh. So the combo you should be doing when you hit Celestial Avatar is 4 first, followed by 3, then spamming 2 and 1 while the others come back off cooldown. Quick Draw also affects these skills as CA counts as a 3rd "weapon set" if I'm not mistaken. Pets Yes, even your pets can support. The Fern Hound can howl on command to heal and give your allies Regeneration. It also has a knockdown leap and a cripple. Taming locations. (or just be a sylvari) The Red Moa can screech on command to give your allies Fury. It also has an aoe healing cry like the fern hound but it will use this when it drat well feels like it and has a fairly long cooldown. Can also inflict Vulnerability. Taming locations. And that's basically it. Remember your field combos and it's all fairly simple. Mash them buttons. Heroes never die.
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Jul 7, 2016 02:06
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These mile long rundowns of each and every trait are cool and all, but I checked some other forums and it turns out you don't actually need to worry about what your build is to play Guild Wars 2. I hope this helps.
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Jul 7, 2016 05:28
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i am going to go into a raid on my druid and my group is going to ask "how much toughness do you have" and i am going to say "2000" and they are going to kick me
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Jul 7, 2016 06:35
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Dreggon posted:i am going to go into a raid on my druid and my group is going to ask "how much toughness do you have" and i am going to say "2000" and they are going to kick me i did a pug raid a couple days ago and ended up accidentally tanking with my druid so yeah
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Jul 7, 2016 07:47
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AnacondaHL posted:Possible minor correction: Shouldn't the Glint DPS rotation include the Facet of Swiftness/Elemental Blast immediate toggle? Oh, yeah, I forgot to put that in, added it. Only word of warning with it is that if your latency isn't good, it'll eat a couple points of energy that you need to have to make the switch to your other Legend before you run out of energy. Magres fucked around with this message at 08:16 on Jul 7, 2016 |
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Jul 7, 2016 08:14
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 and if i lose, i'm going to wait all over again
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Jul 7, 2016 14:15
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Adhesive Gamin posted:These mile long rundowns of each and every trait are cool and all, but I checked some other forums and it turns out you don't actually need to worry about what your build is to play Guild Wars 2. I hope this helps. For 99% of the game, yes you're right, but lots of people like minmaxing their builds for optimal efficiency.
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Jul 7, 2016 16:36
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Kerrrrrrr posted:Druid stuff holy poo poo this took a long time and i don't even play this game anymore but WHO CARES HERE WE GO Thanks! Lots of good info. The build you linked looks quite different from the previous one you linked (LB/staff) and is also not the build you mentioned with condition damage and sword-axe  I might be asking for a lot here but i would really appreciate: 1. a short writeup what the first build you linked is for 2. The difference between the first build and the megapost build, as i got the impression the first build was the heal/group build? 3. a link to the condi damage sword-axe build 4. A build for sustained adventuring, e.g. soloing champions (There is probably a lot of crossover between those 4 points)
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Jul 7, 2016 16:54
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Speaking of optimal builds, say you were going to play a condi ele build in general pve just for fun, how would you go about it? I'm thinking scepter/dagger or maybe focus for firewall, fire and earth traits with tempest, switch between fire and earth attunements mostly. That sound about right?
Organza Quiz fucked around with this message at 17:00 on Jul 7, 2016 |
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Jul 7, 2016 16:55
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Ineptitude posted:Thanks! Lots of good info. The build you linked looks quite different from the previous one you linked (LB/staff) and is also not the build you mentioned with condition damage and sword-axe hoo boy this is a lot of homework and i might not get to it til this weekend if i remember, the first build i linked was for number 4, solo sustain adventuring and events and champions and stuff. it replaces the axe/horn with longbow, which is very good ranged damage that scales perfectly with your berserker gear. longbow itself is fairly simple to use, just shoot mobs with arrows. lots and lots of arrows. pair that with a tanky pet like a bear or bristleback and you'll have no problems soloing open world PvE content. i might have said the longbow build was also fine for group play, but the nature of how druid healing works means that basically any druid build with a staff is good for group healing. when i get home i'll double check the traits and skills on what i linked and make sure i get you the right build. you want Marksmanship instead of Skrimishing if you're using a longbow. the megapost build is less damage (since it gives up longbow), more buff support. i don't remember ever using or linking to a sword/axe build? it's definitely not a build i've used personally.
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Jul 7, 2016 17:57
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lucifirius posted:For 99% of the game, yes you're right, but lots of people like minmaxing their builds for optimal efficiency. Has anyone posted about that yet? I could put a link to metabattle up if anyone wants actually efficient builds.
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Jul 7, 2016 18:25
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Adhesive Gamin posted:Has anyone posted about that yet? I could put a link to metabattle up if anyone wants actually efficient builds. What happened to play how you want? Or does that not apply if it involves tinkering with your build?
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Jul 7, 2016 18:31
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Adhesive Gamin posted:Has anyone posted about that yet? I could put a link to metabattle up if anyone wants actually efficient builds. Yeah there's been a Revenant post, Mesmer posts, and a Druid post. I've been copying them to my personal blog (with credit links) and might post them to /r/GuildWars2
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Jul 7, 2016 18:35
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lucifirius posted:Yeah there's been a Revenant post, Mesmer posts, and a Druid post. I've been copying them to my personal blog (with credit links) and might post them to /r/GuildWars2 Give us a link to your blog posts so hlatun et al. can put it on discord. Adhesive Gamin posted:Has anyone posted about that yet? I could put a link to metabattle up if anyone wants actually efficient builds. Nah, let people browse metabattle on their own. There's so much to look at, and so much that isn't exactly correct, that it'd just be a huge pain.
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Jul 7, 2016 18:50
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This thread is to much for a casual like me.
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Jul 7, 2016 18:51
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This is also for a person who is new to the game and, gasp, might not get meta battle? Since that site isn't exactly newbie friendly
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Jul 7, 2016 18:55
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I think some of the regular posters in this thread may not have figured out who the joke posters are
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Jul 7, 2016 19:00
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Organza Quiz posted:Speaking of optimal builds, say you were going to play a condi ele build in general pve just for fun, how would you go about it? I'm thinking scepter/dagger or maybe focus for firewall, fire and earth traits with tempest, switch between fire and earth attunements mostly. That sound about right? Fire Arcane Tempest, the bleeds in Earth aren't worth swapping for and Arcane gives you burns on crit and when dodge rolling, as well as a shorter cooldown on Overload Fire. Also lets you skimp on Viper gear and consumables if you're just worried about Burning and can use Balthazar runes. Not quite as much golem DPS as power builds and more sensitive to moving enemies (tiny overload fire) but it's solid condi dps. Sprite141 posted:Nah, let people browse metabattle on their own. There's so much to look at, and so much that isn't exactly correct, that it'd just be a huge pain. There's so much to look at, unlike what we've seen here.
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Jul 7, 2016 19:01
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Kessel posted:I think some of the regular posters in this thread may not have figured out who the joke posters are Oh Kes, you truly are a card.
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Jul 7, 2016 19:20
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Kessel posted:I think some of the regular posters in this thread may not have figured out who the joke posters are Jokes are supposed to be funny.
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Jul 7, 2016 19:22
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