Staff

1. Chaos storm is my favorite skill because of boons. In fact you can literally just sit in it. “but Nuu…how can you just sit in a chaos field??!” Phsh, it’s easy! Mix w/Phase retreat or chaos storm! Chaos armor is beautiful because reapplication of boons has no cooldown, so you receive boons & give conditions as fast as you’re struck.
2. Cast at location for self-applied boons. When near a choke point/cluster of people, or you’re not worried about boons, then cast elsewhere, but on a single target, use it for yourself to gain boons. 9/10 melee will run up to you getting the conditions anyways.
3. Pros & Cons – phase retreat: Phase retreat doesn’t let you soak up extra Boons, but you’re further away from your opponent & have a clone out. Now they have to switch weapons to strike from afar, or run through or around the chaos field. Either way, it’s good for you.
4. Chaos armor boons reapply w/out cool down.
5. Invulnerability keeps boons from being activated like aegis, thus tiding you over til the next boon. So use blurred frenzy in chaos field. Also, using imaginary leap in chaos storm combo fields. In addition, the chain skill to make a foe immobile and switch places is super effective.
6. Staff auto-attack winds of chaos only bounces to 2 targets. For 1v1 target, inflict random conditions, then you. If 1v2, bounces to 2 targets & not come to you. Isn’t an exact science, but you’ll get a feel for it.
7. Phase etreat’s evasion mechanics seem to work different than dodging. If you dodge the same time you cast phase retreat it doesn’t work…
8. Illusionary warden great when conditions on foe or clone already out, or about to die. Pairs great w/downed skill #2 phantasmal rogue.
9. If possible, try to keep staff clones up over sword clones for the fact staff clones inflicted random conditions, unaffected by pro-ration. If you have the “clone creation on dodge” trait active, it’s fine because sometimes you just need to dodge. BUT if you can help it, don’t dodge if you don’t need to.

Sword & Torch

1. Don’t overextend yourself or open yourself up to damage just trying to get off a couple sword strikes, while your opponent pops at-location skills that normally would fail.
2. Blurred frenzy is a great hit-confirmation skill. Hit confirmation in the realm of fighting games refers to someone performing a combo and making sure you don’t keep attacking while the opponent blocks, so they can’t use a reversal. The same applies to guild wars 2 — except in the reverse, where your opponent must avoid you. While gw2 doesn’t have reversals, people dodge out or back away instead. Since blurred frenzy lasts for a mere 2 seconds, most average players react too late. Pro/good players will back up, then follow up w/more attacks (especially if they’re melee). Typically what I’ll do in a situation like that is use my distortion shatter directly after for surprise factor. Melee tend to be stubborn with squishier characters since they’re used to winning, so it works in our favor. Now we don’t have to run around to chase them.
3. Another thing: tooltips don’t say, but distortion hits everything in the direct vicinity. Not quit nearby distance — that’s more of an elementalist thing. It can even be debated as being a form of crowd control. Great for clustered capping skirmishes, bunched turrets, enemy clones, or minions.
4. For offhand, I use torch because prestige has the best defensive & offensive capabilities In my opinion. You stealth for 3 seconds, but are NOT invincible. I say this because I already knew it, but unconsciously acted like I was invincible. You can still be AoEd and have conditions put on you like I did to an enemy thief in the 1v1 montage. Don’t make the same mistakes and hang around. Back up, then run back in for the 3-seconds of burn.
5. In fact, if you run a conditions build , they’ll be burning for a good 3-4 seconds worth. In addition of you have staff clones up, they have a good chance of inflicting burn as a condition. If you noticed, the fight I had with the warrior ended so quick because he was burning &/or bleeding the entire time. If you watch the numbers fly, you’ll see he actually had quite a bit of HP. His level of skill is debatable, but there’s no denying the 2-pronged attack was effective.
6. Last thing. If your endurance bar is full & you have a crit-focused build, dodge to keep sword clones up & save vital evade skills like prestige & blurred Frenzy for later. You can afford to constantly dodge from the auto-trait, “1-second of vigor on crit.” vigor increases endurance regen & youll have A LOT of it when using the sword, so don’t let the extra go to waste if it doesn’t hurt your tempo.

Tips & Other Things Left Out

1. Mesmer clones/illusions are invulnerable to damage the moment the mindwrack shatter is activated. Unless changed, that’s how the skill is as of this moment.
2. Shatters HAVE been nerfed, but that’s fine (for now). On tough targets, be sure to shatter often, whether using mind wrack, cry of frustration, etc. I’ll try to cover shatters more in-depth later.
3. Illusionary Leap (skill 3 on sword) also combo fields into chaos armor along with Phase Retreat (skill 2 on staff). Use them!
4. If hot-keyed, turning around while running after someone, then doing phase retreat a split-second after, and turning back around is good to use if not using a focus.
5. Also, illusionary leap is GREAT for making opponent immobile for a bit. Good for pre-blurred frenzy setup.

What Weapons/Strategy/Things should I cover next? Utilities…? Traits? Like & Comment!