Psychic Distraction Anyone?

This skill bypasses anti interruption skills such as mantra of resolve due to its shutdown feature. So it's an unpreventable interrupt.

And I know this because I had this tested :P

Eh runned this skill many times in HA builds.

Same... in HA it's just a wonderfull skill.

Ritual Lords will hate you for bringing this skill. Believe me...

If you have a good connection and good reflexes, it's a great skill. Just use it sparingly (as if it gave exhaustion), because of the self-blackout...

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It's 10 energy. You need a blood rit and still not be able to use it as often as you might need.

And that is why it is often combined with things that feed you nrg while you are blacked-out. *hint* (No, I don't mean BiP and BR) And yes, the best way to use the skill is "pulsing" chaining 3-4 of those so that the black-out effect stacks and is therefore less of a concern, and then pausing for awhile to recover nrg and reapply the stuff that is going to feed you nrg while in the dark.

The real effective way to make a PD build is to have your build focused on PD entirely. When that blackout takes effect on yourself, you need to have had the skills that work upon a long duration - stances and enchantments will play a role in this matter.

E/Me's can use it to some extent ( sp? )

long term hexes provide a secure feed into killing your target as well^^

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Personally I love this skill. You have to use a very long chain of interupts to run out of energy with it. Plus people seem to forget that after interupting with it the interupted skill is disabled for an additional ammount of time (12secs at 16 dom, I think.). It's a fun skill, people tend to swear at you when you use it though...

Yea, I often get main chat bs running PD. It's like: !$!$ %#@^%@$%@ !$!$$!$!$!$!$!$$^@$%$^$^@!&%#@ !!! No, seriously.

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It's the funniest skill to run in RA, ever.

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My buddy calls using this skill "entering a$$hole mode"

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ive been running a PD build in RA for a few days now and its tons of fun, heres the setup i use it with

Fast Casting 8
Illusion 8
Domination 14
Inspiration 12

Psychic Distraction (this is so love)
Arcane Thievery (passive lockdown of one of the targets spells for 33 seconds)
Arcane Larceny (same as above if you get lucky these 2 can be very effective)
Ether Feast (self heal of course)
Distortion (because those warriors are guaranteed to try to rage your face)
Spirit of Failure (combined with distortion for some real annoyance vs wars)
Drain Enchantment (Energy Management and further annoyance)
Res Sig (should always have this)

Basically keep an eye on any enemy warriors assassins or rangers when running this build if your skills are down while they are after you, you are toast.

This build works wonders against eles rits and necros especially and is also quite mean vs mesmers as well since you can make use of their own spells.
If you find yourself faced with a toucher time pd right as he gets to touch range then quickly back off and do it again on the recharge to nail his other touch, touchers are so predictable. PD is also quite effective at breaking an assassins attack chain as well as being quite capable of interrupting bow and hammer attacks with ease.

An important thing to note is this build has no dmg so you must rely on your team to be able to get the job done but with the effective shutdown PD provides it is quite possible to wand a target to death as they stand helpless.

is this skill blocked by obsidian flesh?

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I think SoFailure is pretty much standard with PD. It has the type of nrg management that you want when spamming PD. Channelling is great, esp. in Alliance, but could be a bit risky staying close to the front w/o Distortion. When I used to play PD I used a lot of Sigs- so that my nrg can be dedicated entirely to PD or nrg management skills. I believe Sig of Disruption and maybe like Hex Eater? I'd love to coin a standard PD build. Anyone have any interesting nrg management ideas? <wish we could use Mantra of Recall, would work so perfectly well with PD>

Psychic Distraction
Blackout
Shatter Enchantment
Drain Enchantment
Wastrel's Worry
Diversion
Power Drain
Res Sig

9 Fast Casting
16 Domination
12 Inspiration

My tried-and-true RA Mesmer build. Designed to piss off as many different people as possible, although it has a distinct anti-caster bent.

My general strategy is to hunt and kill any Boon Prots, and then PD everyones attempt to res them.

Some tips:
-Psychic Distraction is an emergency skill - don't use it unless you have to. Use Power Drain if they're casting a spell.
-Wastrel's Worry is good, all-around damage - it punishes runners and those who aren't paying attention.
-Always, always use WW before you Diversion or Blackout - free damage is awesome.
-Generally, it's an excellent idea to queue up a Diversion while you have a target Blacked out... most of the time, you can Diversion a RoF or other handy skill.
-If you see an assassin who's at half health, get ready to Shatter Enchantment - they will generally try to Shadow Refuge, at which point you can spike for massive damage.
-Eles are like delicious candy for you - Shatter and Drain away their Attunements, Power Drain their long-casting skills and either PD or Diversion away their fast-casting ones.
-Despite being a build built around Psychic Distraction, Blackout is still the MVP here. Learn when to use it and when not to use it.


There you go - I've had a lot of success with this build. It definitely takes a bit of getting used to, but when you do you'll have a blast. Make certain to taunt your enemies for maximum effect.