Curse

phlowwotter · Apr 14, 2012, 06:33 AM // 06:33

I've been experimenting various elites and combos and I noticed that both Psychic Instability and Tease interrupts all foes in the area, but the former causes knockdown while the later steals energy. They're only 3 seconds difference. I know PI is wonderful, but sometimes I let my heroes take it or use other elites instead due to some mobs being immune to knockdown (like jotuns).

Anyways, here's a few builds that I came up with using Tease as elite:

Illusion:

FC 10+1
Illusion 11+2+1
Inspiration 10+1

[Tease]
Arcane Condundrum
Wandering Eye
Signet of Clumsiness
Shrinking Armor
Cry of Pain (PvE)
Accumulated Pain
Power Drain/Leech Signet/PvE-skill

Domination:

FC 10+1
Domination 11+2+1
Inspiration 10+1

[Tease]
Mind Wrack/Overload
Unnatural Signet
Cry of Frustration
Cry of Pain (PvE)
Shatter Delusions/Mistrust
Drain Delusions/Power Drain
Chaos Storm/PvE-skill

Illusion + Domination combo:

FC 9+1
Illusion 7+2+1 (or make 10 but lower Dom)
Domination 10 (or drop to 7+2+1 and raise Illu)
Inspiration 10+1

[Tease]
Arcane Condundrum
Unnatural Signet
Signet of Clumsiness
Mistrust
Wandering Eye
Cry of Pain (PvE)
Drain Enchantment/other Inspire skill/PvE-skill

My hero team is usually a SoS Rit healer, ST Defense Spirits Rit, Dom mesmer (Energy Surge), Illusion mesmer (Ineptitude), IV Necro healer, EA Fire Nuker, and a RoJ Monk (can use a 2nd ele nuker or another necro hero using curse/prot).

I've tried a various missions in all 3 campaigns and EotN in HM and it works well, including no problem with energy, but I like to know what you guys think of Tease?

(I know other elites have good or better usages, but I'm curious as to how Tease would fare as an elite and if it is decent to usage with synergy much like how some other elites are)

ultimak719 · Apr 14, 2012, 11:20 AM // 11:20

Tease is excellent energy management for heroes; however, they tend to use it on random skills. If I were to be using a tease hero I would want it to have tease, then be loaded with 10 energy mesmer skills.

Another option is to have a tease healer hybrid, so the hero fuels its heals with tease, whilst providing some party support.

To be honest, compared with other mesmer elites to run, tease is sort of outclassed by them, so if you were to run a tease build with 2 mesmers already in the party it would be fine, but I would not get rid of one of them for tease.

lord norke · Apr 14, 2012, 02:26 PM // 14:26

if my memory serves right tease is a big part of why heroes arn't in pvp anymore

Gabs88 · Apr 14, 2012, 02:45 PM // 14:45

Quote:

Originally Posted by lord norke

if my memory serves right tease is a big part of why heroes arn't in pvp anymore

They hit exceptionally well with it. Doesn't nessecerily make it good in PVE though. In PVE you know you always win, so the importaint factor is how fast you win. In PVP the importaint thing is to win in the first place. How long it takes doesn't really matter

Mintha Syl · Apr 14, 2012, 03:05 PM // 15:05

I have my hero interrupt-only bar with tease in it, and it always worked just fine. However I hardly ever go around with that bar now, panic and pi are just too much better...I use it when I need to face a single strong foe and need him interrupted all the time.

Lanier · Apr 14, 2012, 03:39 PM // 15:39

Tease is great if you need the energy management. I can't think of a time when I'v used it on a mesmer hero bar, but it would probably work well on a wastrel spam bar for heroes since the main problem with wastrels spam on heroes is energy management.

Kunder · Apr 14, 2012, 03:54 PM // 15:54

I can't think of any reason to use Tease over Power Drain in PvE. 1 random area interrupt won't do much and power drain gets back a lot more energy. Not a useful skill at all unless you are trying to e-drain a group, which is only PvP.

phlowwotter · Apr 14, 2012, 09:39 PM // 21:39

So if I want to run a Tease build, it's better in PvP? I thought it was better in PvE due to mobs ball up many times. I know I could just leave the interrupts to my heroes since they are usually faster than me, but I do agree that they don't prioritize skill interrupts (which is why I usually carry at least 1 interrupt on me).

afya · Apr 14, 2012, 10:40 PM // 22:40

Panic do pretty much all the job in PVE imo. It gives the longest shutdown to a whole enemy group and your party use that time period to kill most of the mobs.
Tease was great. but in PVE, Panic > PI > Tease. You don't need that many energy anyway.

Kunder · Apr 14, 2012, 11:34 PM // 23:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by Amy Awien

Tease interrupts any skill on the target while Power Drain only interrupts spells and chants. The AoE interrupts any action which, combined with the shorter recharge, should yield energy at least comparable to that of power drain. That said, i haven't used it on my heroes since the Mesmer buff.

It needs to consistently hit 5 enemies with each cast to equal power drain (taking into account slightly quicker recharge). Not impossible in certain areas, but fairly unlikely to happen every time given that heroes tend to use skills whenever they can on whatever they can.

Interrupting all skills vs. interrupting spells is kind of a draw. On one hand it might be slightly easier to use it quicker. On the other, interrupting skills means it might be used on a lone warrior in your backline instead of the enemy caster ball. You also generally want to interrupt enemy spells more than random attack skills.

And of course, it's an Elite skill, so one would expect it to massively outperform a normal skill in some way, but it simply doesn't do that unless you need to drain enemies' energy. You need to make a build around an elite, and meh energy management is not what Mesmers are in need of. So yeah, I see absolutely no usage for it in PvE.

superraptors · Apr 15, 2012, 01:51 AM // 01:51

panic > tease

phlowwotter · Apr 15, 2012, 01:51 AM // 01:51

Hmm...I prefer using elites from the other attributes, even Echo, but I'm just curious if there are any in Inspiration that are decent.

Kunder · Apr 15, 2012, 02:44 AM // 02:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by phlowwotter

Hmm...I prefer using elites from the other attributes, even Echo, but I'm just curious if there are any in Inspiration that are decent.

Extend Conditions is quite good in the right build, though I personally prefer Fevered Dreams.

phlowwotter · Apr 15, 2012, 03:47 AM // 03:47

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kunder

Extend Conditions is quite good in the right build, though I personally prefer Fevered Dreams.

Extend Conditions? Hmm, I may have to look into that. I've seen the Fevered Dreams build on PvX, though I am curious about how EC works. Was there someone who posted a EC build here? If so, I'll have to check it out.

Cuilan · Apr 15, 2012, 04:02 PM // 16:02

The EC build I have saved is bellow.
http://www.gwpvx.com/Special:PvXDeco...ame=&Go=Submit
It's pretty decent with its duration of conditions and you can use a silencing spear. I use a sup rune for Inspiration but I'm sure you can adjust the attributes. The energy management is a lot stronger than FD builds.

I used Tease with Power Drain to fuel SoH, GDW, and smite removal skills before. Having to rupt and switch back to your party is a bit hectic but that might be a fun challenge for some people.

phlowwotter · Apr 15, 2012, 08:17 PM // 20:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cuilan

The EC build I have saved is bellow.
http://www.gwpvx.com/Special:PvXDeco...ame=&Go=Submit
It's pretty decent with its duration of conditions and you can use a silencing spear. I use a sup rune for Inspiration but I'm sure you can adjust the attributes. The energy management is a lot stronger than FD builds.

Your EC build is different than the one I found and you're right that the energy management is good. The build I found was about the same, except it used Cry of Pain instead of "YAAW!" and I had a somewhat difficulty with energy (I think it was due to spamming CoP for the extra damage and interrupt). I only had a minor Inspiration, but it still works fine with energy management. I wonder if replacing either Phantom Pain or Shrinking Armor with Fragility may help give a little extra damage (maybe give Weaken Armor to my Curse Necro hero).

I like both EC and FD and they both have their advantages and disadvantages. I like EC more due to it being more flexible since I tend to go between single targeting to jumping around each mob and messing with them. FD's great, but I always seem to have a somewhat annoyance of it being only single target and its energy/casting/recharge times. >_<

Anyways, thank you Cuilan for inspiring me to try EC in a different approach!

Lanier · Apr 15, 2012, 10:49 PM // 22:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by superraptors

panic > tease

Can't really be compared since they are used to achieve 2 completely different goals. Its like saying panic > ineptitude... it doesn't make sense because they are both used for completely different reasons and their use is going to depend on which use you need more for whatever situation you're in.

superraptors · Apr 15, 2012, 11:50 PM // 23:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lanier

Can't really be compared since they are used to achieve 2 completely different goals. Its like saying panic > ineptitude... it doesn't make sense because they are both used for completely different reasons and their use is going to depend on which use you need more for whatever situation you're in.

can be, tease is an aoe interrupt that is pretty much useless, non-elite cry of fustration does damage and achieves the same effect, panic is an aoe interrupt pretty much that goes for 10 seconds.

Lanier · Apr 16, 2012, 02:58 AM // 02:58

Quote:

Originally Posted by superraptors

can be, tease is an aoe interrupt that is pretty much useless, non-elite cry of fustration does damage and achieves the same effect, panic is an aoe interrupt pretty much that goes for 10 seconds.

My point was that the main reason people would use Tease in PvE is for the e-management - the rupt is just a nice side-effect. Thats why I use it on my smiter in certain situations and why I'v used it on resto rits in the past. They don't use it primarily for the rupting, like they would panic. I'm not saying that its particularly useful on a primary mesmer (I still can't think of any build where its ideal, except for wastrel's spam), just that you can't simply compare it to panic by saying one is a better AoE rupt than the other.