Wastrel's Worry/Demise (PvP: JQ)

Well I just read the Shockwave (PvP) topic. I don't want to create a seperate topic for every skill but I've been considering this for a while. Anyways I haven't seen anything about this before except a lot of people in game who share these thoughts. (Lots of people I have spoken to) Note: this isn't some thread I want to QQ about **** being overpowered. Just want to mention and hear some other voices about it.

I play Jade Quarry quite often. Nearly in every match I play there are those Mesmer/Assassins (Me/A). No problem at all. But nearly all of these mesmers have Wastrel's Worry and Wastrel's Demise. Still no problem at all because you can cast skills to cancel either of those. For some professions this seems a little harder sometimes. But there are some things I want to point out.
Short: Nerf WD/WW or make them atleast less OPed.

But I really think both or either one of those skills need a nerf for Pvp. Well atleast for JQ. But killing a carrier (Turtle/Jug) within a very short time seems a little too easy in my opinion. The only way to stop them killing a carrier is being a full healer. Healers, which I only get in 1 of the 10 matches I play.
Also a few of these mesmers are running around at the gates near the base to kill every carrier which wants to pass trough. Well you could say that one teammate (damage) could kill them easily. But usually those mesmers have counters for those. So as an assassin or caster your f*cked up. Either by Backfire or Empathy. AND: Most guy I had in my team didn't care about it.
I'd say this problem can solved really easy without even touching the Wastrels's. Just give the carriers some skill they cast from time to time. Just a skill which has no effect and is casted every 5-10secs.

Well second part is capturing. Same story like carriers. A dedicated healer can easily heal the Wastrels's out and prevent the shrines from being captures. But compared to other dedicated cappers? A RoJ monk can easily be interrupted and one heal of divine favor will prevent RoJ from capturing. I'd say RoJ is cool. Nothing wrong with it. Easy capturing but also easy countered. Same story for N/A bombers. They can cap really easy but are pretty easy countered and can't do much more than bomb bomb bomb.
The only way to stop those mesmers either KD'ing them or putting another mesmer in front of the. But those counters also work against the other dedicated cappers?

Solution? Turn down Wastrels's a bit. IMO can be different ways. Higher recharge, less damage, more counters?, long casttime? Or make all other skills recharge for a few secs? I'm sure there must a balanced game.

Like I said this isn't a QQ thread. Just wanted to point something out. BTW, I know this game is getting old so don't mention about that. :P

My only problem with wastrels is it's so dumb to run which is why so many bots use it because it takes no brain at all. Same with shockwave

It's not only about the Wastrel build being OP at killing the carriers.
That same build can easily cap posts, without dying (as most necro bombers do) or waiting for their elite to recharge and being nearly useless in the meantime (RoJ).
Being spammable and with really short cast, not to mention the cost, skills used by Wastrel mesmers open other options. You're not only capping, or only killing carriers, or only keeping your posts up, or only rupting opponents, or only ganking the other team. You can do all of it. Even more so - while WW and WD are easy to deal with by a human player, they still put pressure on their target, creating the need to use a skill, wasting resources on the way.

I play the wastrels build with PI, and can indeed cap shrines and kill carriers. But seriously, in every team there is at least one Mo/P. A monk can keep a shrine alive, can keep carriers alive (and speed them up) and can also easily cap a shrine with roj.
Also an assassin usually kills me easily, if they don't get PI'd on an attack skill.
But if they nerf it, I go back to necro bombing or playing mo/p... so lets hope they nerf all those as well then^^

Talking only about JQ now...

Don't get me wrong - while i'm running a RoJ monk myself, i'm not saying it shouldn't be nerfed. It should, or the AI in JQ should be improved. However, the PI/Wastrel mesmer is even more overpowered than RoJ.
Capping? A bit slower than bomber, noticeably faster than RoJ - thus making it less likely to negate via healing.
Killing carriers? RoJ can't do it. Bomber usually can't do it either. Mesmers can do it nearly as fast as sins, and substantially faster than others.
Keeping the posts? Going /Mo for Healing Breeze is an option, as one HB with 0 in Healing Prayers is enough to keep an NPC up against a single RoJ. Even without it, rupting RoJ is usually pretty easy, and given most cappers run RoJ or bomber... Bombers might be nasty, but then just go /N for Gaze of Contempt and benefit from your Fast Casting, and still rupt any incoming RoJ. This leads to bringing mesmers against mesmers...
Ganking others? WD or Palm sin kills casters faster, giving them no chance, but then they can't do anything else (apart of semi-ganking carriers). Well-built rangers can kill other players quite fast. Other than that? Not really - but the mesmers...

Bombers can only cap - really fast, but that's all. Even a half-wit will escape a bomber. They have no rupting or healing potential, they can't kill carriers before they get healed.
RoJ can primarily cap, and keep the NPCs up, but not so well - it's nearly impossible to keep a quarry against a bomber or a mesmer (as a smiter monk, keep in mind). They can only kill complete retards who stay in RoJ beam and let themselves knocked down with Bane Sig, eating up RoD on the way. Other than that - sure, they have some support, like taking a condition off an ally, but they're nowhere nearly as powerful and versatile as mesmers.
Other builds are either strictly specialised, being able to do only one thing properly (and usually it's ganking either carriers or squishies), or are mediocre at what they're doing, easily countered by even a smiter monk.

Wastrel skills should have their recharge made longer as well as their cost higher. The damage is fine, and so are the duration and conditions to trigger. However, make it 10+s recharge and 10+e cost, so that it's more of a situational skill rather than a spammable pressure to make people trigger Backfire or fuel their interrupts.

Don't see any problem with them, easy to deal with if you use a little brains.

AI at quarries got no brains. And when mesmers blow them up quicker and with more power than RoJ, something's wrong.

Compared to the bomber the mesmer is quite much better in overall. The mesmer can do lots of more things. The only thing bombers are better at is the capping part, but this is countered by the fact that they can't do much else. The mesmers easily kill the jugs/turtles without any resistance, except for the other team. It wouldn't hurt to let the carriers cast a certain spell around every few seconds, without any effects, but just to cancel WD/WW.

Well about Mo/P healing. A carrier can only be saved by a dedicated healer, and maybe with a lot of struggle by a roj monk.

The Wastrels's are easy to counter for a human player though. Gives nice pressure and really fills up the role of a mesmer imo. But like drkn said and probably much other too: the AI at quarries is brainles. And that is where the mesmers shine.
Even without PI the mesmers can capture, though with more effort.

Easy counters are available - the meta just isn't using them. I don't see why the skills need to be nerfed to make up for that.

Yeah, the shrine AI could be made a little smarter (which would be a necessary fix for AI across the whole game, PvE heroes included). Fix the NPCs, don't nerf the skills. (And this is coming from someone who doesn't play mesmer in PvP.)

yet your avatar is a mesmer skill .... sure you don't play a mesmer.


What counters are you talking about lol ?

Not signed.

Wastrel's Mesmers are unable to kill a carrier through a real Monk, it's not easy for them to kill Archer shrines either (without using elites like Panic), are unable to kill other players well, etc. Compared to other builds they are not the best cappers around, not the best player killers around, not the best defensive build around, not the best build to put against a real Monk guarding a turtle, etc.

If Wastrel's is nerfed RoJ Monks will dominate the arena (they are already very strong).

The real question is, how often do you see a 'real monk', not a RoJ smiter, in JQ? At that, properly doing their job?
Also, what's 'wrong' about using an elite skill to cap a post in JQ? Not that RoJ monks do it all the time...

You trollin'?

1. I said I don't play a mesmer in PvP. That doesn't mean I've never played one.

2. Nobody's talking about nerfing Signet of Midnight.

3. Last I checked, there's no rule that says your avatar has to be a 100% accurate representation of oneself.

Any half-decent hex removal and healing. I am a sucky, sucky monk. But that's what I play in JQ because even a bad monk like me can counter bombers, RoJ, and Wastrels mesmers.

I have no problem with WW/WD for capturing spawn points. It is fast and efficient, and because both sides use it, there is a lot of capping. This is very good because it means more faction and a game where no one caps sucks.

But, the WW/WD carrier killing is a little over the top as currently, that is one of the only efficient ways to kill the carriers. Personally, of all the things suggested, simply adding a skill they use every 5 seconds makes the most sense. It only affects those specific skills by making it harder to simply spam WW/WD, while not touching the rest of the pvp balance.

I've got no problem with their performance at shrines, but the carrier killing happens pretty darn fast.

Mostly it can be negated with a Restless, which abuses the same "no skill use" factor of the carriers. My Mo/P specs like 3 in Healing and can keep carriers up 90% of the time with Restless, Fall Back, and Divine Favor healing. Usually a Restless is plenty.

I remember a while back people complained about RoJ the same way. "It's a single skill that lets you cap, but then you can bring whatever other utility!"

So perhaps a skill as you suggested on carriers that has minimal removal or even no benefits at all on a 8-10 second recharge.

If you appreciated the power of real Monks, you might see them more often. I know I played one last weekend and won somewhere around ~80% of my games, which was better than I could achieve with Wastrel's. I could almost hold a shrine against three cappers, which says a lot.

@FengShuiDove - you may not noticed it, but I'll say you hit the nail on the head. The Mesmer can kill a carrier through a RoJ Monk. Shatter Enchant takes out Restful Breeze while stuff like Kitah's Burden keeps the carrier in range. However, to do so, the Mesmer needs to give up on other important stuff such as Backfire (important to take down a shrine defended by a real Monk, kill other Wastrel's Mesmers, etc).

Dom Mesmer is the most versatile profession in JQ at the moment and can bring skills to perform any role, but it is not the best at any of those roles except killing undefended carriers. Still almost any build can kill undefended carriers easily, so no argument there. And once the Mesmer specializes, its other capabilities suffer, e.g. unless it's willing to spec into Inspiration and bring Ether Feast, it typically does not have self-heal; unless it brings Shatter Enchant, it has trouble with Restful Breeze, etc etc etc.

Strong template, but overall my verdict is balanced.

I'm going to confirm this as i played monk as well, but i have to say it was more likely because my opponents had no clue what they were doing, not really because 3 of these mesmers cannot do anything ...

Most players just insisted capping the shrine as there was only 1 NPC left at some moment, but let's face it :
- they could just get on an other shrine
- they could split their job ( 1 on archers shrine, 1 on me, 1 on the shrine), i would surely miss something
- they could just get the turtle or something

Like each bomber/roj/mesmer i'm facing is just getting in the teleport, going to x shrine without caring of anything and using his skills( in the exact same order) on NPC's only...

My only problem with Mesmers Wastrels skills for JQ is that they kill carriers way too fast when a monk is not present.

The idea to add an extra low-recharge skill to carriers for the purpose of combating Wastrel-type skills was introduced about a month ago I believe, in this thread. It's a good idea, I think.

Yes, but that's a short fix, it won't really do much.. If you have a monk, you will be able to handle . If you don't, it generally won't matter whether your turtle is dying in 5 or 8 seconds...

If you watch Jade quarry from all points, the problem is the ability to kill NPC's from out of their range. You use RoJ, NPC's will then start casting on you, and will die while casting. Rangers can cap shrines without getting hit. Mesmers use chaos storm, NPC's start using skill, then the mesmer uses psychic instability...I guess you can see the obvious problem here and why there were complaints about melee being ineffective..

I can't really thing of a solution for turtles only( except making carrier's defense like : recharge 10 sec ; one random atacking target is kded for 3 seconds), and the only way to do anything would be to split NPC's on the shrine, so at least these aren't capped in half a sec and it will make it more fair for everyone..