Guide:Mesmer

Mesmers are able serve a variety of purposes. In general PvE, it is agreed in the main that mesmer have been dealt the short stack, and mesmer players may find themselves frustrated by lack of quality spells that work well in PvE (PvE only skills have alleviated this problem somewhat). In specialized PvE roles, Mesmers are very capable if interruption, and boss killing or shutdown, but such applications are often limited. In PvP, however, Mesmers really shine. They are a versatile class that is able to hex opponents, frustrate melee classes, drop enchantments, deny all energy, and stop casting almost completely. Because most Mesmer skills are based on what skills an opponent will be likely using, the best Mesmers must have at least a basic understanding of the common skills used by other classes. With such powers of annoyance, Mesmers have a penchant for attracting the attention of enemy melees and opposing Mesmers.

Attributes

Fast Casting

"Fast Casting decreases the casting time of your Spells. Additionally, each rank in this attribute decreases your Signet activation times by 3%."

Investing in this primary attribute is wise, as many mesmer skills require hexes to be placed at key moments and the reduction of a 3 second cast time to 1.87 is a welcome benefit. One of the most used mesmer elite skills: Mantra of Recovery, comes from this line, as well as a few other less common elites (Arcane Languor, Stolen Speed) and some skills dealing with signet recharge and activation.

Domination Magic

"No inherent effect. Many Mesmer skills, especially spells which disrupt spell-casting and deal direct damage, become more effective with higher Domination Magic."

Domination Magic is perhaps the most important attribute for Mesmers. This attribute is the reason that spell-casters fear and loathe Mesmers. It is linked to a large number of skills that disrupt the target's actions while dealing damage. One of the most popular of these is Power Spike, which interrupts and deals damage if the target foe is casting a spell thereby serving two purposes.

Most Domination Magic is focused on punishing their foes for taking action. Empathy deals damage on every attack; Guilt steals energy on offensive castings; Backfire deals a great deal of damage on any spell cast. And, a special case; Wastrel's Worry punishes opponents for doing nothing at all.

Illusion Magic

"No inherent effect. Many Mesmer skills, especially spells which deceive your foes and hinder their movement and attacks, become more effective with higher Illusion Magic."

Illusion Magic is a mixed batch of skills, with varied effects. This makes it difficult to give a blanket description for the general effects that all Illusion skills provide. However, Illusion Magic skills generally focus on damage over time through degen, on hindering melee opponents, or on slowing casters.

The most commonly seen type of Illusion Magic is damage over time (DoT) degeneration spells like Conjure Phantasm or Phantom Pain (often on secondary mesmers). These spells spread pressure throughout opposing teams, and can often overload a monks healing capacity. On a Memser with a taste for melee-hate, many skills work against annoying melee classes. Elite skills like Ineptitude and Cripling Anguish can slow or even blind meleers, and other regular skills can force adrenaline/energy loss on attack, cause damage on/interrupt attacks, or slow attack speed.

Another function of the Illusion line with skills such as Frustration, Arcane Conundrum, and the elite Migraine is to slow the casting time of enemy spells by up to 100%, thus making them much easier to interrupt, divert, and otherwise stop.

I final elite of note is Signet of Illusions which allows the next 1...2 spells cast to use the mesmers illusion attribute instead of their regular attribute. This gives some access to interesting combinations, and the primary skills of other professions.

Inspiration Magic

"No inherent effect. Many Mesmer skills, especially spells which generate energy and reduce damage, become more effective with higher Inspiration Magic."

Inspiration Magic is a very important attribute for Mesmers. Whereas Domination Magic is focused on disrupting foes and dealing damage, Inspiration Magic is focused on disrupting foes while healing either the Mesmer's health or energy, or simply protecting and healing the Mesmer in various ways. The Inspiration line shines in gaining energy for the caster. An amazing 23 skills (out of 39) help you gain energy in some way. Some simply steal energy from foes. Drain Enchantment, Inspired Enchantment, and Inspired Hex along with the their Factions copies Revealed Enchantment, and Revealed Hex) remove hexes and enchantments and give you energy. Power Draininterrupts a spell and gives you energy. And, several mantras (another Inspiration specialty) give you energy in addition to their myriad effects in defense (see: Mantra of Flame, Physical Resistance, Mantra of Concentration).

Inspiration Magic can be a very powerful attribute, but due to its lack of many skills that actually deal damage, you will be forced to utilize other attributes. Inspiration Magic is best suited as a support attribute, keeping the Mesmer alive while other attributes' skills deal the damage.

Types of Mesmers

PvE

As a mesmer is PvE, your survival is going to be mostly based on exploitation of the computer AI.

• AI ignores elf-damageing hexes
• AI removes hexes as soon as they are signted (If the enemies are able)
• Most AI enemies attack between castings

Domination Magic

Backfire is the crux of a anti-caster PvE Domination mesmer. The AI won't stop casting until doing so would be fatal. Empathy applies in the same way to physical attackers: warriors, rangers and, even more so, assassins. Unlike Backfire, however, the monster will not stop attacking while under this hex. Use Chaos Storm to apply pressure to casters or to disperse monsters due to the AoE damage it does.

Illusion Magic

Use mobs equipped with hex removal skills to your advantage, by casting Phantom Pain or Cracked Armor on targets, as they will always try to remove it, triggering the condition. AI controlled opponents will always attack in-between skills, therefore, Images of Remorse will often do its conditional damage, making it a cheap damage dealer skill and a quickly recharging cover hex.

Inspiration Magic

Often, you'll know what kind of enemies you're going to encounter in advance. When dealing with elemental damage, you should always consider taking the corresponding protection mantra. Which to take is often easily predictable by locations: in the Shiverpeaks] it is clearly best to take Mantra of Frost, while in Charr-heavy areas Mantra of Flame is most useful.

PvP

PvP Mesmers generally utilize either Domination Magic or Illusion Magic with a subset of the most popular Inspiration skills (especially Power Drain and Drain Enchantment) for energy management. Most PvP mesmer play one of four key roles: shutdown, interruption, hex pressure, or energy denial. They often bring either a utility elite like Hex Eater Vortex or a shutdown or energy denial elite (Mantra of Recovery, and Power Block are often used). Mesmers also typically bring Shatter Enchantment for enchantment removal and damage on a spike.

Shutdown and Interruption Mesmers

Dominations Mesmers in PvP utilize strong interrupts and shutdown hexes to stop opponents from casting them, and forcing heavy penalties such as longer recharges and energy loss with skills like Diversion and Shame. A typical role of the Domination Mesmer is to simply sit on one target (usually a monk, but sometimes a blind-bot or anti-melee necromancer) and stop that target as completely as possible from doing anything. Other Mesmers specializing in interruption often bring the Illusion elite Migraine to slow casting as well as Domination line interrupts to harass and punish as many opposing spell casters as possible.

Hex Pressure Mesmers

Illusion Magic is rare in organized PvP outside of splits in GvG and hex pressure teams. Illusion Mesmers typically use an elite hex and various other hexes to force the collapse of enemy monks as well as punish hexes.

Energy Denial

Mesmers are very powerful when it comes to taking the energy away from a single opponent completly. With skill combos like Ether Phantom and Drain Delusions from the inspiration line, and other skills like Power Leak in the Domination line, Mesmers are often able to keep a target without any energy for the larger part of a match. The Domination elite Panic can also serve in this capacity on hex presure teams.