Preliminary Skill Update Notes: Feb 19

HAHAHA. omg you're not serious? So, what, you're guessing based on... nothing that the TK hates mesmers, paragons, kittens, long walks, and sunsets?

We test what's given to us to test. We don't have some all-consuming power over anet to get them to ask how high when we say jump.

The main issue is that you're stuck on "my often used builds" and... so you want us to not look out for ourselves (We're not) but we're to have your personal interests in mind for balance. How, exactly, does that work?

With the impending "nerf" to shadow form.. just a thought: What's going to happen to the Skeletons of Dhuum? They were put in place (and failed) to damage the SF farmers, so are they going to remove them because they will become forever more useless? I still find it ridiculous to completely to disable an entire "species" of monk entirely because of those little bastards.

The ecto from them is nice, but, really? I'd like to see them gone. Also, I don't expect to see this update until February next year. Being incredibly vague and nonspecific isn't the proper path down this clarity route they were talking about months ago.

Yesssssssssssssssssssszzzzzzzzzah goodbye Obie Won everytime Kanobie, goodbye Cheating Form, goodbye 600 Spartans asmiting. Finally the game can get back to where it belongs with no more invulnerable farming for dollars.

Stop picking single bits and using it to twist what I say, please.

can you say if it's ANet giving you things to test? if yes, is it someone competent or a random, not necessarily playing guy knowing nothing about all the classes/skills?

I have a mesmer. i've completed just about everything but proph with a VoR build, and tbh i couldn't give two shits about high end pve. it's slow, but it works no clue what you were getting at by quoting my profession, i'm pretty sure playing hammer war takes more skill than hexing, and is more likely beyond what you're capable of if you're whining about pve being too hard.

I'd also like to shank people with my toaster, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't designed for that.

This is what I see every time I look at that page.

I really am having a hard time seeing this update as anything more than one big cruel joke.

aNet: "Let's ignore Mesmers Beastmasters and Paragons, give Rits and Nec's some more unneeded love, and nerf farming for all but the "We live on GW in a permanent party with other like-minded individuals"-types, who are about the only ones who will be unaffected by this.

Don't get me wrong, I like to build, but to me these all look like a case of exchanging one set of cheesy /gimmick builds which were whinged about too much, with a new set of cheesy /gimmick builds that are yet to be picked apart and whinged about enough to receive the nerfbat.

This game is old hat, not some new flashy fandangulous wonder. We all know how it works, we all know why aNet are really trying to force as many loyal customers away from it as they can. They saw what happened in the NwN>NwN2 thang, and don't want to have to bundle GW2 with GW1 just to sell it.

They want us off, and they want it now. Or at least it sure seems that way.

That's such a flawed statement when you use it with Guild Wars.

Darn they're nerfing SoS, plus they should nerf shadow form... I mean like really nerf it. I have a sin and its a complete joke. No one in their right mind should have made a skill that can make you invincible.

oh well slightly less dmg for SoS isnt that bad XD

Maybe more than nine times out of ten, the skills and mechanics that are being looked at are brought up and proposals for adjusting them are put forth by the Devs of ANet, and I would assume that what they are basing the need for some of these changes off of is Obs Mode and feedback on the latest few skill balances, as well as any other issues of the week/month/year, such as everyone's QQs over Mesmers and whatnot.

On a side note, I've decided that I don't believe Mesmers need a lot of help in PvE, reason being that giving Mesmers aid in PvE settings would require either:

• Buffing a number of Mesmer skills, mainly and especially in direct, immediate damage, which would probably not be beneficial for PvP.
• Require a shitton of skill splits, which are bad for the game in essence, because they're skill splits.

So, Mesmers aren't really meant for high-end PvE, or at least the way they're meant for PvP doesn't transfer well to high-end PvE. I don't see a problem here.

I should add though, I'm willing to change my position on this if you can give me a list of proposed changes to Mesmer skills that would make them viable in high-end PvP, wouldn't break PvP, and wouldn't require more than three skill splits (it was going to be zero, but I guess I'm being generous).

i always thought that every class should be desirable and playable in pve and that's the ultimate goal of balancing.
if that's what you think, then change the manuscripts and note on wiki that mesmers are not designed for pve and if someone's thinking about making one, they won't get buffed in because not, because they're pvp-only. warn newcomers beforehand, as i followed the wiki descriptions when i picked my very first char and i loved mesmers from what i've read. too bad it's all a lie and it turns out that it's intended to be kept that way.
more buffs for necros and rits then, go go.

^Skill splits hurt no-one. They're an intelligent and beneficial way of keeping both sides of the bread buttered without dropping it in the dirt.

Mesmers were just fine in PvE, IMHO. Right up until VoR got lulwut-nerfed, for no real reson except to appease PvP'ers who got sick of being VoR chained to oblivion, mainly because most of them are just too stupid to stop attacking.

IMO, PvP'ers, unless they play just as much PvE-probably more, simply because PvP is so niched by design, don't really have the PvE experience to have an opinion anyway. As such, IMO anything they say is generally driven by a "Those other bastards" mentality, and based on a whole load of experience. At PvP.

You're right there. Thing is, VoR was tremendously effective in PvE. Onoes! Mesmers are shining! Can't have that!! NERF!!!

Good start to fixing Mesmers, let me flog this dead horse just a little more: FIX F##$$%G VoR!!!

Or they could do the same thing the blood magic and rit changes did, and make more combinations and synergy.

Give Mesmers more skills that are triggered by "every time you interrupt...", "your next hex...", "whenever you steal energy...", etc. Make them rewards for doing what a mesmer is supposed to do, thus keeping the tactics and specialties, but give adequate incentive to use those strategies in high end play. And the more of these that are tied to Fast Casting, the more viable a primary mesmer is in these roles.

A single interrupt is nearly worthless, but if the interrupt was also a vector for another effect, your mesmerizing skills would be rewarded with more power without being simple HURR, DAMAGE!

a VoR split and cry of pain revert would be a pretty reasonable request, but reworking every mes skill, making them all pve/pvp split isn't.

but really, my opinion on the whole thing is that mesmers aren't bad enough that they're unable to pve in hm, and it isn't likely to be changed, so it's prob a better idea to suck it up rather than make a buff mesmers thread once a week.

i am pretty sure some of the most fun i have in GW is with my mesmer using Mindbender.

Because you aren't able to SC an elite area anymore, the influx of rare weapons to the game will stagger, making them more valuable, thus providing an incentive for the farmers to play those elite areas.

I couldn't agree more. My point is simple: We already had limited tools at our disposal for PvE, VoR is just the most glaringly apparent example atm of a skill pointlessly nerfed for reasons completely unrelated to PvE.

See, the thing about VoR is, it was ours. A true Mesmer skill. What was it replaced with? Nothing. In fact, it was double-slapped by nerfing CoP alongside it, rather than simply changing it to rely on the FC attribute, which would have ended any cross-class abuse right there and then. Sure it would still have been useable with SoI, but for non-mes primaries, this would have the effect of limiting it to 12 points(+cons), rather than 16 which only Mesmers can hit.
This might of course, involve re-working the FC line a little, shove a few skills that should always have been there over to it. Bit of work, but aNet have shown in this latest update that they can and do change skills attribute line when it suits them. I ask, why not do the same thing when it suits everyone, and not just them?

Congratulations! You just ignore stuff and make things worse. It took you guys just 5 months to make such an awesome skill update. I`m sure all the players will it when it comes.

We have already established that caster control in general isn't effective. The never gonna happen part is a pretty lame excuse to not do anything.

Awesome, a rational, intelligent GwG user.
nothing wrong with mysticism in itself, the problem is more the cause of the poor synergy between skills. cracked armor isn't a big deal. seriously.