13 replies to this topic

[Xienzato]

Hi all, I was just wondering what stats Mesmers should focus on in PVE. From what I have read it seems that full berserker gear is the way to go. However, I noticed that I will have no bonus vit/toughness which would make me extremely squishy. I assume this isn't much of a problem given how hard enemies hit in dungeons that it won't make any difference, but what about WvW? I assume you'll need vit or toughness. Is it recommended to buy berserker gear for PvE and a separate set for WvW? (eg rabid which has toughness/condition/precision as I want to go mainly via the confusion route).

Thanks!

[Elrathan]

The reason why most people go with zerker or rampager is that mesmers have tons of survivability build into their weapons. Between blink, decoy, blurred frenzy, distortion, high vigour uptme phase retreat ect. you have plenty tools to completely avoid damage. This means that vitality and toughness are wasted unless you don't manage your cooldowns properly, while damage stats are always benefiting you.

For you, however, I'd recommend starting with a little toughness and vitality, with a bigger focus on toughness (kinghts gear is a good place to start). This is a complex class and you will make mistakes in the start. Personally I'm still running with two pieces of knight's gear with the rest zerker since I find that gives me just enough toughness for when I miss a dodge or something.

As for WvW, check here https://forum-en.gui...Pve-Shatter-Cat as WvW is not my area.

[jpg1]

Elrathan, on 24 February 2013 - 10:11 PM, said:

The reason why most people go with zerker or rampager is that mesmers have tons of survivability build into their weapons. Between blink, decoy, blurred frenzy, distortion, high vigour uptme phase retreat ect. you have plenty tools to completely avoid damage. This means that vitality and toughness are wasted unless you don't manage your cooldowns properly, while damage stats are always benefiting you.

For you, however, I'd recommend starting with a little toughness and vitality, with a bigger focus on toughness (kinghts gear is a good place to start). This is a complex class and you will make mistakes in the start. Personally I'm still running with two pieces of knight's gear with the rest zerker since I find that gives me just enough toughness for when I miss a dodge or something.

As for WvW, check here https://forum-en.gui...Pve-Shatter-Cat as WvW is not my area.

Very ture. I would have to agree that there really is a ton of options when avoiding damage with a Mesmer.

However, I would really love to see some more flexibility with the class - I've been playing mine for a little over 100 hours (my second class, after my Guardian) and still have that notion of support stuck with me. I think Mesmers have their own style of doing support roles, and I would prefer treating the usual Berserker route as a fallback. You will never go wrong with it unless you do not know how to manage cool downs as you have pointed out. One of the few interesting reads I've had with the Mesmer is the this right here.

While you can see that this build suggests the use of the other trait trees not directly linked to damage-generation, the bonus to toughness and vitality are mere byproducts of a support style for a Mesmer. As I've tried pointing out it actually has a bit of flexibility when it comes to Gear selection.

[Xienzato]

Thanks a lot for the replies, they have helped a lot. I just noticed a gear set(can't remember the name) that has condition damage/precision/power. It's interesting because it has slightly less power than berserker and has added crit damage, but has a decent amount of condition damage to make up for it. For someone like me who would like to run a 'typical' staff/GS 20/20/0/0/30 shatter build, do you think the increase in condition damage makes up for this? Ideally I would like to have the condition damage so as to make my conditions somewhat useful, while retaining a decent amount of power/crit...

[jpg1]

Xienzato, on 28 February 2013 - 08:53 PM, said:

Thanks a lot for the replies, they have helped a lot. I just noticed a gear set(can't remember the name) that has condition damage/precision/power. It's interesting because it has slightly less power than berserker and has added crit damage, but has a decent amount of condition damage to make up for it. For someone like me who would like to run a 'typical' staff/GS 20/20/0/0/30 shatter build, do you think the increase in condition damage makes up for this? Ideally I would like to have the condition damage so as to make my conditions somewhat useful, while retaining a decent amount of power/crit...

The typical route as you say is a build based on Berserker Set (Power/Precision/Critical Damage %). Most builds you will see here will be about that - this build can contribute to huge damage bursts since Shatters and Phantasm Damage are influenced by your character's Power and Precision. They don't gain anything from Condition Damage however.

The set that you are mentioning is Rampager - I am actually running with this set at the moment and I would say that damage-wise is just decent. I don't reach the damage count that other players mention in this forum that reach 8-9K. I may be doing around 60 - 70% of that. The Condition Damage is really only good to maintain some damage on a single target that you inflict bleed on. You can easily stack that given a 20/20/0/0/30 build. Again it's a trickle of damage compared to the bursts a usual Zerker Mesmer can do.

It's the issue of Critical Damage % versus Constant Condition damage. You really need to keep the bleeds constant for you to be able to match the Bursts coming from a Zerker build.

But then again - you still Shatter and Damage with Phantasm. At this point I really can't say where the damage levels match up.

[Raagar Deathclaw]

Zerker gear out does Rampager for dps except for maybe in pve because when multiple characters use conditions they cap at 25 stacks lowering the dps of anyone using conditions. for dungeons I think zerker gear is the way to go, in wvw I would check out osicat's shatter cat mist build on the official forums

[flipfly2004]

I'd recommend going for rare armor and trinkets as they are cheap and are not too far behind from exotics. Take p/v/t gear and knight's trinkets first. As u play u will learn how and when to dodge. Later u will notice that u don't get hit very often. That's the time u switch to exotics piece by piece until u r full zerker. Hope it's helps. Oh and btw,  learn to use f4. After a while u will have a lot of fun to melee with a mesmer using s/s and s/f like me

[shimmerless]

As others have said, it's best to work towards Berserker's since the Mes has a wealth of innate survivability options. I think it helps you to become more acquainted with your class mechanics and your skills too since you can't choose to just ignore them if you want to live. You really want a good melee setup to be reaching your damage potential, but if you're still practicing one option can be to slot a staff too and switch to it if you're in a bind. Staff #2 is one of our best mobility skills and chaos armor is likewise extremely useful.

Thankfully, WvW/PvP is a lot more flexible for us... there are a million different options, and aside from the silly "one jewel" restriction in sPvP you're really not limited in any way. You can build your Mes however you best like to play him and still be very competitive. It's not a bad idea to slot some toughness/vit since smarter opponents in groups will typically 'test' your resilience and mark you out if you're a squishy target. For a burst build I'm usually comfortable riding at ~17k effective health, 18k if I'm lucky, with the rest specced for pure damage. This gives decent wiggle room to recover from heavy enemy burst while sacrificing very little in the way of armor choices.

A lot of our more interesting stuff that doesn't see much use in PvE opens up, too: for example, if you spec for full confusion damage and take a combo like scepter/torch, you can watch players literally kill themselves.

Edited by shimmerless, 03 April 2013 - 11:12 PM.

[Elysen]

flipfly2004, on 02 April 2013 - 09:49 AM, said:

Take p/v/t gear

Never take vitality for PvE.

Ever.

[Dahk]

Xephenon, on 04 April 2013 - 09:18 AM, said:

Never take vitality for PvE.

Ever.

Huh?  What do you see wrong with vit in PvE?

[shimmerless]

Xienzato, on 28 February 2013 - 08:53 PM, said:

Thanks a lot for the replies, they have helped a lot. I just noticed a gear set(can't remember the name) that has condition damage/precision/power. It's interesting because it has slightly less power than berserker and has added crit damage, but has a decent amount of condition damage to make up for it. For someone like me who would like to run a 'typical' staff/GS 20/20/0/0/30 shatter build, do you think the increase in condition damage makes up for this? Ideally I would like to have the condition damage so as to make my conditions somewhat useful, while retaining a decent amount of power/crit...

In my experience the Mes has two competitive sources of conditions: one is vulnerability (from traits) and the other is confusion. Sadly confusion is only exceptionally powerful in PvP, since mobs have slow AA windups (not to mention the overall issue with damage conditions in PvE).

On the other hand, vuln is very useful in PvE, even more so if you're not grouping with Warriors who can chain OMM. There are two traits in our power line, Dazzling and Rending Shatter. One is a minor, and Rending Shatter is not only cheap but does work with Illusionary Persona. This means you can very rapidly place a max vuln stack (in an AoE no less) without really sacrificing anything in your build.

Other than vuln, I would argue conditions are a wash for a pure PvE Mes.

[Elysen]

Dahk, on 04 April 2013 - 12:05 PM, said:

Huh?  What do you see wrong with vit in PvE?

30k HP isn't going to save you from failure to dodge an agony attack at 40+. Higher HP just makes your healing less effective.

Edited by Xephenon, 04 April 2013 - 08:19 PM.

[Dahk]

Xephenon, on 04 April 2013 - 08:18 PM, said:

30k HP isn't going to save you from failure to dodge an agony attack at 40+. Higher HP just makes your healing less effective.

That's fine for straight attacks, but toughness does nothing for condition damage.  Even with tons of toughness, something like the spider boss in AC can take you down from a few ticks of poison.

If you were talking about advice given to someone doing only 40+ fractals, I can see where you could make this argument, but vit is being recommended here as an assist for someone who is new to the class, so I don't see any problem with it.

Edited by Dahk, 04 April 2013 - 11:37 PM.

[Elysen]

Dahk, on 04 April 2013 - 11:33 PM, said:

That's fine for straight attacks, but toughness does nothing for condition damage.  Even with tons of toughness, something like the spider boss in AC can take you down from a few ticks of poison.

If you were talking about advice given to someone doing only 40+ fractals, I can see where you could make this argument, but vit is being recommended here as an assist for someone who is new to the class, so I don't see any problem with it.

A group should have plenty of condition removal for mistakes, be it through Guardian using Soldier runes or finishers through a light combo field or any other means such as Null Field. The AC spider is avoidable if you stand out of the red circles.

While I'd agree take a more defensive approach when learning, never take full Soldiers as you will be relying on your defence too much and dragging the fight to an uncessary length. Full Knights is fine.