Mesmers vs Necromancers in PvE - which one needed buff?

Yeah indeed, let's make'em Perma-like, like you suggested. *rolleyes*

Shame those skills deal armor-ignoring gamage, something any Ele would envy...

New Age book? WTF are you talking about, RAPE???? Name some "New Age" books and ill tell you if I've read them. you don't seem to understand what bias means in this context. You started this thread as an innocent question, a request for an opinion, but then attacked any one who answered an open-ended question the "wrong way." You should have titled this thread: "Mesmers should have been buffed, not necromancers" and made an argument accordingly, i have no problem with that. Instead you invited people to share their opinions, not hinting to the fact that you would be attacking them. Next time just state your opinion and invite people to argue with you, not ask for theirs and then attack them.

please refer here for all mesmer problems (in pve) in one massive post.

as for ESurge and EBurn: shame those skills have long recharges, are conditional and there are only two of them. i'd rather have five non-armor-ignoring instead.

i think that Josip went off the line with some of his posts, too. not all that you claim he did, though, and it still doesn't affect what was already pointed in numerous sardelac and the prelim discussion threads.

My biggest frustration in PvE from monsters is from Mesmers. PvE monster mesmers tend to come in 2 forms. Both forms have varying degrees of effectiveness, but both are extremely annoying. First I see is the energy drain sets. Energy Surge, Energy Burn, Power Leak, Guilt, Shame, etc. is seen fairly often. You get targeted by them and you struggle to have energy to cast. The other kind are the degen hexers. LOTS of Conjure Phantasm, Phantom Pain, etc. which causes a lot of pressure for the team healers. Now, the part that really hurts? Most of those groups have Cry of Frustration, Power Drain, etc. as well. Tell me it doesn't hurt when you face a group of Windriders and your team is covered with degen.... and then your team starts to cast spells or use skills and get multiple people hit with Cry of Frustration around the same time. Yes, flagging can help some with hero+hench, but some areas have little room to spread out, and the AoE is quite large.

I think the biggest problem The Josip has is the focus on damage. Mesmer does not do as much damage as other classes. That doesn't mean they don't have options that perform extremely well for a team build. Stop trying to play a class NOT designed around damage as a damage dealer.

I obviously do live under a rock. Pdrain? Who? Where? Channeling? Who, where? Auspicious Incantation, who, where, when? Same with WNWN. Who uses these skills? Necros with soul reaping? EMo's? Rt's? Epidemic is all nice, except I see this skill used so rarely on PvE rangers that I really don't understand what you're talking about. RRt splinter or something like that is far more popular but correct me if wrong.

So seriously, if you want, we can go to ZM outposts few days in a row, and scout people there. Let's see how many have Me secondaries. Actually I will do that just now.

I apologize if it looked as if I needed peoples opinions. No, I don't need that mental garbage called opinion. I invited people to join argumented discussion. If I wanted X Y replies I'd open a poll instead.

So as you can see, I couldn't less about yours or anyones elses opinion one way or the other. I want logic, reason, arguments, facts, historical data, stream of consciousness.

I will use this person MagmaRed to explain to LazyLink what I meant. Look carefully LazyLink at this persons posts. Where do you see logic, reason, arguments, facts, historical data, stream of consciousness? Nowhere.

Example: I give many examples how buff to some mesmer skills can improve the class and make it useful. Blackout, Shared Burden, Power Spike, Diversion. These were my examples.

MagmaRed comes and keeps saying post after post how Im wrong because I want mesmer to be about dmg. How is it possible to have any discussion like this?

Ever heard about Arcane Echo? Also, ever checked most Ele skills?

(How's come any non-spammable skill "sucks" nowadays?)

Not in PvE, where enemies have almost unlimited energy.

And they are unblockable. And they cast almost istantly with decent Fast Casting. But that's irrelevant, isn't it?

Ever heard about Hexes?

Overload? Wastrel's Worry, Wastrel's Demise? Just to name a few eh.

Well you obviously invited people for their opinions, and you enjoy tearing them apart. when in your OP did you ever say "i want reasoned, logical arguments, not just your opinions without the evidence." oh wait you didn't, and the same applies to the title of the thread.

Omg it was already stated ten times that it's not about damage per se, look at mesmers skills and then at necro skills- it's not about damage only, lower recharges,energies cost, better effects.

I find this very idea disturbing, that in any any at all discussion about anything, you think I want opinions and not arguments, logic, reason, facts, evidents, data - and that I need special disclaimer up-front so that people know these are requirements? We're not in elementary school so that I need to request basic knowledge of english and comprehension, and usage of mental abilities. When people decide to login to gw and grind they can disable their mental capabilities and do stuff on reflex. Here, in forum, I expect more. Sorry if I ask too much, wow, it's not like I'm in a herd of monkeys asking for superhuman displays of power and prowess.

It's like talking to a wall and further discussion.. errr I mean opinionating is pointless.

So, you opened a thread about something obvious as Earth being round. You filled it with absurdities, delirating analogies. You backfired anyone not agreeing with you.

Why should WE care then? Why should WE care about your absurd ideas of balance? Of you failing HM Missions because you chose a class you can't play effectively? Of your scientific demonstration that Mesmers indeed sucks?

Are you happy now that you've proved that Mesmers suck beyond repair? Now that you've stated the obvious?

Does this change the state of the game? No. Does this speed up improvements? No. Do you really expect any developer to come here and read through the whole thread and buff your Mesmer with a magic wand overnight?

It's just a rant. A mindless rant, and it's getting irritating. What's the point of this thread then?

PvP players in this thread need to learn reading comprehension and GTFO. Also, the entire premise of this thread is ridiculous, since it's so obvious which one needs a buff. Why not just title the thread "Buff Mesmers in PvE, and leave it at that lol

If you want a serious debate you have to state it, this isn't philosophy class where it's implied, its a forum about a video game. There are plenty of easy going threads around. Writing an OP as you did and then expecting people to take this very seriously with reasoned arguments is illogical and more importantly this entire argument could have been avoided if you stated you intentions plainly.

I am not asking you to treat me like a monkey, i just want honesty.

Pdrain and wnwn are popular among heroes for their reflexes (as well as tease but i'd failed to mention that in my first post), channeling is a staple in any /me farming build, the echos are useful for nuking (pvx wiki is your friend for all of the SCs that have /me), auspicious is usually combined with deep freeze. Splinter is more popular than BHA, but that doesn't mean that BHA doesn't exist and isn't effective.

Make sure to ask everyone you meet their hero bars so you don't have a faulty survey for excluding "players." It also wouldn't hurt to stop by once in a while for elite areas and look around as well.

It's obviously not obvious, otherwise mesmers would get buff not necros.

Why should I care about your inability to comprehend what I said regarding balance? I'm not a teacher.

Argumentum ad hominem, again.

If someone says class sucks and needs a buff instead of class X, he must be pathetic and can't do the mission. Dream on.

Of course, instead of scientific demonstration I should be posting opinions on how mesmers are OK and impossible to buff anyway.

The only thing I proved is your lack of comprehension.

Mesmers dont suck beyond repair, I proved lack of will to do repair.

If you think Riverside and Sanitarium subforums are useless, contact gwguru admins not me.

@Magma - i agree, mesmer mobs are annoying. but that's because they face a real player - up to some point, 'mobs play pvp' all the time. if they could prioritize interruptions and hexes and if changing a staff to a sword didn't make them cast empathy on mages, i think that groups of mesmer mobs were overpowered.
but it's all 'if'. and it's their side. too bad that it works the other way for 'people playing pve'.

@Gill - you miss the bigger picture.
yes, i have played an elementalist in pve. in normal mode, fire ele steamrolls everything. in hard mode, when i'm bored with the lowered damage, i can tank, heal, defend my party with wards or interrupt+kd mobs with maelstrom/meteor/meteor shower. i can even combine some of those, as maelstrom and meteor need no attribute investment to kd/rupt, so i could go into water/earth for wards.
i could also spam blindness. and spam snares.
i am one of those players that don't think "pve = damage", sorry. wrong arguments here.

non-spammable skills suck because you don't face one-two mobs at once, but five-ten. you have to be able to kill - or damage - or disable - or interrupt - or prot against - or blind - or weaken - or snare - either several targets at once or several targets in a short time.
this is when recharge times and the amount of synergised useful skills come. if you can cast only one backfire on one caster mob every two whole groups, something is wrong - you could just go /e and take one of several skills for even bigger, non-strippable, non-conditional DPS (even in hm).

sorry, i may be wrong, but i still get the feeling that you haven't played a mesmer in the end-game and your knowledge is wiki-based. mesmers look really decently on a paper, but in practice, well...
hexes are strippable. wastrel's worry is useful on proph/eotn bosses and abaddon, yes, but it gets stripped on regular mobs. three seconds is a lot of time to have that monk mob take it off with 1/4s or 1/2s spell. not to mention that a mob has THREE SECONDS to use ANY skill and wastrel's worry won't trigger. i loved to use it to fuel up CoP - cast worry first and then cast CoP to interrupt anything the mob might use in response to worry. worked great. too bad CoP got nerfed (i always voted to tone it down just a bit and tie with FC, as TNtF is tied to leadership) and worry lost it's synergy. especially that it's still hard to interrupt in hard mode, with CoP following worry or not.
other hexes are easily strippable/interruptable and usually based on health degen rather than direct damage.

you've made a point with overload. it's quite fun to run on lyssa's aura. still, it eats up an elite slot and you have nothing other than overload to fuel it up (unless you waste another slot for flare, but we're focusing on mesmers-only now, as i understand). also please note that the aura is strippable and has a long recharge itself.
and with no decent energy management, overload burns your own mana quickly. the main difference is that eles have loads of skills aiding their mana pool indirectly - just cast attunement and go on the killing spree. i won't even mention necro's SR. if you want to maintain your energy somehow as a mesmer, you have to invest points into inspiration and waste at least two slots (as one of the most useful skills for this, ether signet, has 45s - sic! - recharge time). i don't think it's worth 40 damage +50 conditional damage. it's fairly low even in normal mode, tbh.
another difference with eles here is that ele's e-management and nukes - or prots - are all synergised. you don't have to put 10 points in attribute other than fire to have your fire attunement giving you lots of energy, not to mention that your overall energy pool is high. now take a look at one of the most used hexes - as you've mentioned that skill type yourself - backfire. cost: 15e - that's high for indirect, conditional damage. recharge: 20s - it can't be maintained even on one target, not to mention casting it on several casters in a single group. cast time: 3s - cut it with FC - it's still interruptable by mobs. and it's still a hex - if it gets stripped, even dealing that 140 damage, you can't reapply it back or use on another target for 20s - most groups of mobs are long dead by that time.


edit: as i've said, i'm not into giving mesmers a damage buff. you've brought the damage up, i've just replied to show you that they're inferior to eles in the bigger picture - and that's how it should be. please refer to the linked post to see what i'm concerned about.

Aye, because if someone has some decency and honesty and post here "Mesmers role in PvE is to suck" that would be at least be an opinion, instead here comes tons of obnoxious arguments like: "mesmer heroes are great at interupting so memers do fine in pve".

What does that prove, that there are bad players who use monk heroes? EMo NRt, those are healers. Pdrain and Wnwn are subpar options that some players use with subpar heroes. Which exactly proves my point.

Fair enough, but I'm not taking into consideration degenerative forms of gameplay but general PvE.

Who uses Deep Freeze in general PvE (HM)? Especially with Auspicious? Out of 500 eles you're going to find what, 2 of them that use Auspicious? That's hardly super popular combination.

Of course, but it's a niche skill for some missions like Gate of Pain (was it?) and in no way epidemic candidates for popular skills.

The reason why shutdown is effective against players (both in PvP and PvE) is because they have strategy and synergy. Their power primarily comes from their builds, the way they work together, and the way they use them. Hence, shutdown vastly decreases their effectiveness, because they've specialized themselves for doing something (even the most "general" of usable warrior builds is still specialized; the only warrior builds that are unspecialized enough to be truly "general" are crappy warriors who try to spam flare).

Moreover, shutdown also ruins a player's momentum and puts them into a situation different from the norm which they must now deal with. Now they have to change their playstyle in a way that is not as optimal as they would have liked, or suffer the consequences (whatever they may be).

Against monsters in PvE, none of these factors exist. Monsters have crappy builds full of useless skills, predictable AI, little synergy with one another, and no true teamwork. Their power comes almost entirely from their insane levels. Hence, the only thing shutdown accomplishes in PvE is preventing damage. But there are far better options for that, especially considering the various passive defenses monsters have against certain forms of shutdown (such as energy denial).

It is for this reason that the mesmer is less than optimal for PvE, despite it's prominent place in PvP. There's really no if's, and's, or but's about it. As long as we take as true the assumption that shutdown prevents less damage than other, more direct methods (and I'd have to ask one what they were smoking if they didn't), then mesmers as they are currently designed will not be anywhere near as effective in PvE as the ones that dominate the meta.

Are mesmers useless? No, I'd stop short of saying that. They can spam EVAS better than anyone else, for example (the only other profession combo that can compete there is A/Me, and even then, Mesmers can either take Mindbender in addition to FC or just take FC and leave themselves a free PvE slot to work with).

That does not mean, however, that mesmers don't need a buff. There's really no question that they need one. The question is, how to go about it? What skills/monsters/whatever need to be changed (and in what way) in order to facilitate mesmers becoming more useful in PvE?

There have been a lot of good ideas so far, and it's that direction I think we need to continue in (I'll stay on the sidelines, though; I prefer to make suggestions about professions I actually know something about ).

No, sorry, it's you saying that Mesmer take 5 minutes to kill anything in Vizuna HM. If that's what you've experimented while playing your Mesmer, you're obviously doing something extremely wrong.

Yep, you dished very reasonable suggestions, such as shared imbalance to have all the classes equally overpowered. And you call that a repair? Pfff...

If you think you know how to fix the game, there's a suggestion page on the wiki. Sorry, devs don't waste their time reading everthing on fansites, expecially threads like this that scream "childish squabble" from the very title.

This thread isn't suggesting anything, it's just a rant.

So what do you want threads to do, give everyone a pony?

We can't change the state of the game. All we can do is call attention to problem areas. Mesmers being flat out ineffective as compared to anything else is a problem area. Therefore, threads like these call attention to it.

What's the point of any thread on this forum? Is this discussion less worthy than people complaining about the XTH going down, or the discourse on the stupidest thing heard in all-chat? This is a discussion. We are discussing. That's what forums are all about.

If you don't like the thread, don't post in it, because it certainly isn't doing anyone any harm.