What exactly does "FAST CASTING" do?

Could someone please let me know.

It speeds up the casting time of a spell, it's effects are shown here

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/content...ing-id1177.php

There's also one skill tied to Fast Casting, Mantra of Recovery

This is what it does.

Thank You very much for the info.


FYE: I did use search first but did not get the chart with it.

The fast cast is what I'm struggling with right now. I want to test out a Me/El or El/Me. What I can't decide on is whether I want Fast Cast or Energy Storage.

If I go mesmer, I'll have fast cast, but if I don't have enough energy.... fast cast isn't going to do me any good. Likewise, if I go elementalist, what if I have all that energy, but need to wait for my spells to recharge? Siiiigh. What do you guys think?

Also, this is a personal thing, but I love my mesmer. I know I can dye the ele armor green, but it's not quite the same.

hmmm it could work with mesmer/elementalist

I'm not build expert, but from my understanding you can use fast casting, inspiration magic, and whatever elemenatlist attribute you want to focus on

and whenever you are out of energy, just use skills like energy tap or skills that involve you getting energy while disrupting others in the inspiration line. That way you'd be casting quicker than regular elementalist while stealing, hexing, or disrupting them in the process to steal their energy... hehehe that sounds interesting

-edit-
Don't flame me saying its wrong i'll feel sad and stupid

Co2, you're right. That's what I do with my mesmer primaries. I'm just thinking that a Me/El will be very energy intensive, and with my other builds, I run out of energy, even when I'm leeching energy with my Me/N, so I'm afraid that more than half of the time I won't be able to cast from having run out of energy.

Yeah I've tried Mesmer/Necro, but I realized that its more conveniant with soul reaping than fast casting. Even though I prefer mesmer primary look, but oh well. So I don't know if memser/elementalist is as effective early on as it is later or is effective later than early. I'll try it this next BWE, but I bet there are plenty of builds already practiced and tested that is similar just gotta do some research. Or just do it myself

Because I think the reason why its harder early on is because of the low inspiration magic points.

Fast Casting reduces your cast time by a percentage, check out the table that Allmightybob already posted below to see exactly how effective it is at each level.

Since it works as a percentage, it has a more profound effect on longer-casting time spells than spells that already cast quickly. This means that it's generally of little benefit if you're already using .25 second cast time mesmer interrupt spells, but it really starts to shine when you're casting a 2 or 3 second cast time spell like Energy Tap or Energy Drain.

The elementalist line has some of the longest cast time spells in the game. In fact, since the Animate X spells were sped up, Elementalist probably has the slowest casting spells, hands down. Fast Casting can really shine on a Me/El, but as others have noted, you'll probably need to rely heavily on Inspiration to fuel the energy-hungry Elementalist spells.

Is there anything that helps reduce the recharge time?

I've realized the only reason why it was difficult to run mesmer/necro or a reason why mesmer/ele would be a little difficult was because the inspiration line was a bit recharge excessive?

In an attribute, no (Yeah, there's three primaries to affect energy, one to affect casting time in some direction way, none to affect recharge. Does seem odd, doesn't it?). In skills, sure. Glyph of Renewal, Mantra of Recovery, Oath Shot, Mantra of Inscriptions, Flourish, and more all play with recharge to one extent or another. Not everyone works with every skill but they can all be used to shorten recharge times in some way.

Edited to add :

Actually, it's the Monk that's got the longest. Those Resurrection spells are absolutely glacial to cast. The Elementalist has some pretty darn long times, sure, but they don't have anything like the 8 seconds it'll take you for Resurrection. Even Fast Casting changes that from "ludicrously long" to just "intolerably long". Either way you're screaming "INTERUPT ME NOW!"

If you are going to go Me/El, definately consider the spell Manta of Recovery {Elite}. While it sucks that you are giving up your elite slot, it allows you to cast spells much more often. With it on, you will be able to cast those energy taps much more frequently.

-Virt

Oooh ouch... Without being able to add points to the elmentalist primary attribute manta of recovery seems a little bit harmful, subtracting 8 energy each time you cast a spell.

meaning 5+8= 13 energy
geez it would cost 13 energy to steal 13 energy LOL! while using energy tap while manta of recovery is on... phew. A hard build to really work with really.
Hmmm I guess with mesmer as primary and elemantalist as secondary. You could be a fast medium damaged elementalist that does disrupts, but I can't seem to find a decent way to Make use of using fast casting with those high energy costing fire spells that does major damage while managing energy.

Mantra of Recovery scales with more points in Fast Casting

At 12 Fast Cast it costs +3 energy per spell.

If you cast Energy Tap, you steal 13 energy, at a cost of 5 energy. So you net 8 energy.

With Mantra of Recovery, you steal 13 energy at the cost of (5+3)8 energy. So you net 5 energy. But you can cast it twice as often. On top of that, you can't forget that energy tap is not simply a way to gain energy- you steal from your enemy. So while you still only net 5 energy per cast, your enemy loses 13 per cast. With mantra of recovery, they lose 26 energy instead of the 13 they lose without.

I believe the cost from spells goes down to +2 at 14 Fast Casting.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH! LOL ahaha I wasn't looking at the skill carefully I assumed it was linked with Energy storage. Sorry about that Now that makes more sense. Seems like its more possible for a really good Mesmer/Elementalist