Curse

Numa Pompilius · Sep 20, 2005, 09:16 AM // 09:16

I've now played through the game with a W/Me and a Me/Mo, and played up through south shiverpeaks with a W/Mo and a Mo/E, and this is my impression of their relative uberness, from fastest to slowest:

* Mo/E - Very good in PvE. Can tank, nuke & solo. Doesn't work well in random arena. An E/Mo would probably be even more uber in PvE.
* Me/Mo - pretty divine in PvE but can not solo if specced as a mesmer, needs support of a tank. Useless in random arena.
* W/Mo - Can solo, but non-melee mobs take ages to kill. Works _great_ in random arena.
* W/Me - Playable, but advance in the game is VERY SLOW. Not completely useless in random arena.

Most fun to play: the Me/Mo, hands down.
Least fun to play: the W/Me, hands down.

Also tried out a blood magic necro and a bow/pet ranger, but that style of play didn't appeal to me and I gave up on them.

cookiehoarder · Sep 20, 2005, 11:04 AM // 11:04

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manderlock

That makes no sence....................How then would the group know your a good Mes?

You can keep trying but its true, PvE rarley requires a Mes.

Wroooooong.

Inspired enchant+Mark of Protection from the yakslapper ftw

Dumeka · Sep 20, 2005, 11:30 AM // 11:30

Quote:

Originally Posted by Numa Pompilius

I've now played through the game with a W/Me and a Me/Mo, and played up through south shiverpeaks with a W/Mo and a Mo/E, and this is my impression of their relative uberness, from fastest to slowest:

* Mo/E - Very good in PvE. Can tank, nuke & solo. Doesn't work well in random arena. An E/Mo would probably be even more uber in PvE.
* Me/Mo - pretty divine in PvE but can not solo if specced as a mesmer, needs support of a tank. Useless in random arena.
* W/Mo - Can solo, but non-melee mobs take ages to kill. Works _great_ in random arena.
* W/Me - Playable, but advance in the game is VERY SLOW. Not completely useless in random arena.

Most fun to play: the Me/Mo, hands down.
Least fun to play: the W/Me, hands down.

Also tried out a blood magic necro and a bow/pet ranger, but that style of play didn't appeal to me and I gave up on them.

You must be kidding when it comes to Mo/E.

I play one myself since the WPEs and its the best pure healer of all the other combinations.

Just equip orison of healing, word of healing, healing breeze, heal party, mend aimend, remove hex, glyph of lesser energy and rebirth (need to raise your protection high to lessen the recharge or use rez signet instead) and you can keep your whole team alive most of the time in any arena.

You can of course vary with other skills like kiss of dwayna, shield of regeneration and so on, but it always depends on what you are going for.

A Mesmer is always usefull in the arena too if you know how to play them well.

By W/M and W/E I would only point to hammer and knockdowns and you are good to go in PvP and PvE.

funbun · Sep 20, 2005, 11:51 AM // 11:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dumeka

Add me to your friends: Dumeka Shoren

I have a Necro/Mesmer myself and sometimes didn't go accepted because of my professions myself (mostly Thunderhead keep where I can provide tons of help actually and have proven it to many).

As about the SF, I was there yesterday with my monk and we had a female mesmer with us also so no worries.

Not everyone is so retarted to not accept someone because of his/her class in the game.

I will be there tonight again between 6PM - 8PM GMT+1 in case that you can come just drop me a whisper and we go farm together a bit or do a quest or two!

Other than that you can find me in different times on weekends (also after midnight

).

Add me also:
Big Papa Pump lvl 16 W/Mo
Big Daddy Mayhem lvl 20 Me/E
Priestess Tonia lvl 20 Mo/Me

I like haveing Necros, Mesmers , and Rangers on my team. My monk is in SF now. So we can team up if you like.

Photeus · Sep 20, 2005, 12:07 PM // 12:07

I love Mesmers and Necros. I personally believe that the reason they are largely ignored is because their spells usually aren't very noticable. However, since I tend to play as a fire Elementalist, which got me well through the game, I have come to notice that my own spells are hardly noticable. I have to use specific combos just to be able to kill a Monk. Mesmers can interupt my 'nukes'. Warriors can cut me down. Rangers hardly take any damage. Necros just heal back life they drain from me (however, I fare best against them). Elementalists seem to work bests on themselves, and Fire Elementalists work best on Ice Imps and Seige Ice Golems. I'll probably be changing my build soon for something a bit more interesting, and less nuking. Heck, I even see the joy of water magic with Maelstrom alone. It's like Firestorm + Meteorshower without lame involved.

I have personally had the most fun with my Elementalist NOT playing as the 'nuker' per se. For example, it's fun to run smiting builds. I'm thinking about running a dark damage build soon. It has also been a lot of fun playing with Earth magic (even though 180 armor isn't worth a damn).

But if you want to yell at a lame fire Elementalist, give me a ring at IGN: Photeus Prime. I'd be happy to help out any Mesmers or Necros anyway they need.

Numa Pompilius · Sep 20, 2005, 12:41 PM // 12:41

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dumeka

You must be kidding when it comes to Mo/E.

I play one myself since the WPEs and its the best pure healer of all the other combinations.

Thing is... this was an average random arena round with my monk:
<My monk and three random paladins run out into the arena>
<like homing missiles my three paladins attacks the smite/prot monk on the other team, doing zero damage but taking quite a lot themselves>
<the three remaining enemies all target me>
<I spam heal on myself for 2-3 minutes while getting smacked & DoT'ed>
<I die.>
<My three paladins keep smacking the smite/prot monk for two more minutes, then die.>
<GG>

I get zero support from team in random arena, so the way I see it I could either respec to a smite/prot monk, or play another class.

Quote:

A Mesmer is always usefull in the arena too if you know how to play them well.

Frag mesmers are boring, basically one-trick-ponies (well, 'one shot' really), Domination mesmers are fun but helpless without support, and both usually die within one minute of entering the arena, and hardly if ever get ressed. When the enemy concentrated so much on some prot/monk that they forget about me, however, then I could totally screw the other team. Doesn't happen often, though, even in random; most know it's a good idea to target mesmers before monks.

As a W/* | E/* you can do reasonable damage while retaining reasonable tankability. In random arena, that is a good thing. In PvE... Well, like I said, my mesmer seemed much more uber than my warriors.

coolsti · Sep 20, 2005, 01:58 PM // 13:58

I never thought much about the Mesmer's ability to drain energy until last night when I played the ROF mission with henchies only. I had equipped only spell and warrior interrupters mostly (Cry, backfire, ineptitude, clumsiness, arcane echo), had no direct damaging skills, and only had two skills that drained energy. Then I came across some sort of Mursaat monk boss, and as much as we all pounded him, he was healing himself quick enough so as not to take any real damage. After about 10 minutes or so of this stalemate, I just started pouring on the two energy drainers plus arcane echo and ignored all other skills I had (which didn't seem to be helping matters much in this fight). And finally it started to work. The Monk boss started losing HP and I finally won the battle. So I would suppose the key here was reducing his energy enough at least temporarilly so that he had to take a pause now and then in his healing abilities.

Why is it that I always seem to be missing the one or two skills I seem to really need when I am out with my Mesmer? Probably because the skills are so darn diverse and you can only take 8 of them at a time.

Mr Fenring · Sep 20, 2005, 02:00 PM // 14:00

Warriors generally make a beeline for the casters, and as mesmers are often anti-casters, they don't expect much resistance, so it's always hilarious as the ubiquitous W/Mo runs up to you, flails blindly for a second or two, then runs away...
The problem with being a mesmer in the arena is that you can only concentrate on one strategy - anti-warrior leaves you horribly exposed to elementalists, anti-monk leaves you helpless against the warriors, and so on.

Dumeka · Sep 20, 2005, 06:45 PM // 18:45

Quote:

Originally Posted by Numa Pompilius

Thing is... this was an average random arena round with my monk:
<My monk and three random paladins run out into the arena>
<like homing missiles my three paladins attacks the smite/prot monk on the other team, doing zero damage but taking quite a lot themselves>
<the three remaining enemies all target me>
<I spam heal on myself for 2-3 minutes while getting smacked & DoT'ed>
<I die.>
<My three paladins keep smacking the smite/prot monk for two more minutes, then die.>
<GG>

I get zero support from team in random arena, so the way I see it I could either respec to a smite/prot monk, or play another class.

Frag mesmers are boring, basically one-trick-ponies (well, 'one shot' really), Domination mesmers are fun but helpless without support, and both usually die within one minute of entering the arena, and hardly if ever get ressed. When the enemy concentrated so much on some prot/monk that they forget about me, however, then I could totally screw the other team. Doesn't happen often, though, even in random; most know it's a good idea to target mesmers before monks.

As a W/* | E/* you can do reasonable damage while retaining reasonable tankability. In random arena, that is a good thing. In PvE... Well, like I said, my mesmer seemed much more uber than my warriors.

Well in that case I must say that its not your fault, neither does that say that your monk were useless.

Everyone of us made bad experiences no matter in pve or pvp and thats not build related you can believe me on that.

If your warriors are too dumb to understand that they do nothing against this monk as long as he is buffed its obvious that the battle is lost.

Thats also one point that I don't like warriors mostly, the most warrior players I came across they run through a horde of enemies only to get the opposing monk with the result that they own team gets killed while they run behind the running around the whole arenas.

One thing that many people doesn't get is that even a monk has a limited energy and if the whole team focus on one other spellcaster they will be able to get the spellcaster no matter what since the monk either will run out of energy by the amount of damage the target gets and the healing needed or the target will die at the end while the monks skills are still recharging (happened to me a few times so I talk through experience!).

My Necro/Mesmer rocks both in pvp and pve I must say and I love her since I'm playing with her since the first WPE!

Quote:

Add me also:
Big Papa Pump lvl 16 W/Mo
Big Daddy Mayhem lvl 20 Me/E
Priestess Tonia lvl 20 Mo/Me

I like haveing Necros, Mesmers , and Rangers on my team. My monk is in SF now. So we can team up if you like.

Sure thing!

If I won't be able to find you under the week due to the time differences, I will check for you this weekend.

coolsti · Sep 21, 2005, 08:48 AM // 08:48

A reason why Mesmers maybe are not so liked is that many people probably don't play them correctly, and in this case a Mesmer can be relatively worthless to a group. For example, a warrior can use no skills at all but still can do a lot of damage with their attacks and higher armor class. An elementalist playing only as pure fire nuker can do a lot of damage. A necro who just creates a lot of minions and does nothing else can also do a lot of damage. But a Mesmer that doesn't know the value of the various Mesmer skills and spells and instead equips only direct damaging skills (or equips the wrong skills for the quest/mission at hand) is far less effective than the other classes.

I played for a long time with someone who played a Necro pretty much like a warrior, never ever using any of those nice team support skills like pool of blood. After he got bored of his necro (no wonder!) he switched to an elementalist, and proceeded to play that like a warrior too, charging to the front lines all the time, fire nuking, and of course dying a lot. And of course he found that boring after a short while. The point I am making here is that many people play stupidly or with little or no regard for the tactics that are available with a given character's skills. And so I imagine it is the same with a lot of people who play Mesmers. So no wonder the Mesmer class is not considered much use by many.

The first time I tried to play the ROF mission, as Mesmer, I joined a group of human players. While waiting to fill out the party, I asked the others if they knew what to expect in the mission, like, what skills should I best equip? Were there a lot of spellcasters? A lot of warriors? A lot of hex-givers? A big bad powerful boss that absolutely needed skill or spell interruption? No answer. Nada. Despite the fact that at least half of the group had tried the mission before. So I took whatever skills I was currently equipped with, and they were not the best for this mission. And the group was probably wondering why I couldn't be more help. Go figure.

funbun · Sep 21, 2005, 01:00 PM // 13:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by coolsti

A reason why Mesmers maybe are not so liked is that many people probably don't play them correctly, and in this case a Mesmer can be relatively worthless to a group. For example, a warrior can use no skills at all but still can do a lot of damage with their attacks and higher armor class. An elementalist playing only as pure fire nuker can do a lot of damage. A necro who just creates a lot of minions and does nothing else can also do a lot of damage. But a Mesmer that doesn't know the value of the various Mesmer skills and spells and instead equips only direct damaging skills (or equips the wrong skills for the quest/mission at hand) is far less effective than the other classes.

I played for a long time with someone who played a Necro pretty much like a warrior, never ever using any of those nice team support skills like pool of blood. After he got bored of his necro (no wonder!) he switched to an elementalist, and proceeded to play that like a warrior too, charging to the front lines all the time, fire nuking, and of course dying a lot. And of course he found that boring after a short while. The point I am making here is that many people play stupidly or with little or no regard for the tactics that are available with a given character's skills. And so I imagine it is the same with a lot of people who play Mesmers. So no wonder the Mesmer class is not considered much use by many.

The first time I tried to play the ROF mission, as Mesmer, I joined a group of human players. While waiting to fill out the party, I asked the others if they knew what to expect in the mission, like, what skills should I best equip? Were there a lot of spellcasters? A lot of warriors? A lot of hex-givers? A big bad powerful boss that absolutely needed skill or spell interruption? No answer. Nada. Despite the fact that at least half of the group had tried the mission before. So I took whatever skills I was currently equipped with, and they were not the best for this mission. And the group was probably wondering why I couldn't be more help. Go figure.

Basically you saying Mesmers don't apeal to the lowest common denominator.

Vicha · Sep 21, 2005, 02:10 PM // 14:10

I have tried many profession. My highest character (Vicha Grizzly) is a Ranger/Elementalist. I pushed her pretty far and still enjoy playing with her. But I must admit the I prefer playing Mesmer/Necro, or even my big Warrior, a Warrior/Mesmer. When I started playing this character, my skill bar was purely Warrior, but the more I play, the more I switch orange skills for pink skills. Don't know exactly why, but I enjoy playing Mesmer, and the better I get to know him, the more I like him.

Mesmers are just more fun to play with.

Doooom · Sep 21, 2005, 06:30 PM // 18:30

I have the same problems with my necro if it helps any. Like someone posted before, the problem is that most people use cookie cutter builds and can't appreciate creative players.

sorrlymesentoe · Sep 22, 2005, 01:29 AM // 01:29

Quote:

Originally Posted by Aniewiel

And how does one assess a player's "good play" or "poor play" based on "Me/Mo LFG for Furnace"? LOL!

i agree whole heartedly, i deleted my mesmer in the desert because i knew that it would take WEEKS to do one mission, since i wouldnt get any good grps and have to drag friends to help me

octaviancmb · Sep 22, 2005, 07:03 AM // 07:03

Quote:

Originally Posted by sorrlymesentoe

i agree whole heartedly, i deleted my mesmer in the desert because i knew that it would take WEEKS to do one mission, since i wouldnt get any good grps and have to drag friends to help me

...and that's just sadness, because it's in the desert and beyond that a Mesmer really and truly comes into his or her own. I sorrow for you and your deleted Mesmer.

Things I've learned from this thread:

1) People still don't know what Mesmers are capable of or how/how much damage a Mesmer really deals.
2) Most people's attitudes about the profession will never change, regardless of how much discussion is done toward that end.
3) It's not just me; pretty much every Mesmer feels screwed over by the general GW community.
4) Even in Sorrow's Furnace, an area that practically screams, "Hey, bring a Mesmer," ignorance is winning out. No one wants a Mesmer.
5) I might as well just PvP.

cmb

Ashley Twig · Sep 22, 2005, 07:46 AM // 07:46

Quote:

Originally Posted by octaviancmb

...and that's just sadness, because it's in the desert and beyond that a Mesmer really and truly comes into his or her own. I sorrow for you and your deleted Mesmer.

Yeah, people give up so easily. Let's hope for the deleted mesmer, that s/he's in a better place now.

This "I give up" mentality seems far spread in GW.
I say "Never give up, never surrender. To the end of us all!!!"

Quote:

Originally Posted by octaviancmb

3) It's not just me; pretty much every Mesmer feels screwed over by the general GW community.

True, but they must be doing something wrong, because some mesmers (like my Helena of Ascalon) never really had severe problems, getting on a team.
Just a few days ago, when defending Kryta, the team had just one monk. One person had to go, and I thought: "Ok, this time it will be me, the mesmer".
To my surprise, a warrior got kicked.
Maybe I just got lucky, but then again, I must've been lucky for the past 3 months.
She's the one who completed most quests/missions.

Quote:

Originally Posted by octaviancmb

4) Even in Sorrow's Furnace, an area that practically screams, "Hey, bring a Mesmer," ignorance is winning out. No one wants a Mesmer.

Tell it to the rangers.

They've got it bad there too.

But please: folks: don't delete your mesmer, just because nobody invites you.
It's been said several times: If you can't get into a group, start one of your own.

Arcanis the Omnipotent · Sep 22, 2005, 07:56 AM // 07:56

Heh, usually when I'm ignored in a city area, I ask all the other people who are being ignored to invite on me if they want to be in a group.

coolsti · Sep 22, 2005, 08:36 AM // 08:36

Quote:

Originally Posted by sorrlymesentoe

i agree whole heartedly, i deleted my mesmer in the desert because i knew that it would take WEEKS to do one mission, since i wouldnt get any good grps and have to drag friends to help me

Sorry, but I cannot understand this attitude at all. I would hope that you deleted your mesmer also because you don't necessarily like the character, and not because of the reason you give above.

Firstly, the Mesmer is an excellant character for playing the entire game with only henchies (or with a part henchy/part human group). This is what I am doing, not because I can't get into a group, but because I like playing with only henchies when I want to have the time to explore an area at my own pace. For example, I never do a new mission with PUGs because they rush too quickly through them. Except for UW and FOW there is no place in the game which can't be done with henchies only (if you doubt this, look at various threads on this forum talking about that).

Secondly, you can always get a group together by forming your own! I had a difficult time getting a good group together for Thunderkeep so I gathered 4 henchies and advertised for 3 humans that didn't mind going out with a part henchy group. No problem in finding people, and the people I found were better players because they joined the group under my conditions (me as Me and with henchies in the group).

In particular, the desert is a great place for an Me + henchies!

Ashley Twig · Sep 22, 2005, 09:07 AM // 09:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by coolsti

there is no place in the game which can't be done with henchies only (if you doubt this, look at various threads on this forum talking about that).

I'd like you to do the titan-quest in Ascalon with hench only.

coolsti · Sep 22, 2005, 09:40 AM // 09:40

Ok, haven't been there yet! And haven't heard of it! Is that something you get after you finish the game? I still have to do the very last of the ROF missions.