Why do mantras have to be prepared?

[green plum.7514]

Again, don't get me wrong, I really like how mantras on FB work and I enjoy the charge management they come with. My post is about the need to recharge them every time you change maps or instances. Its a simple quality of life thing. Like yesterday, I died on a story mission because my mantras "suddenly" were not charged even though I charged them a minute earlier...

[Xithryl.2807]

> @"green plum.7514" said:

> Again, don't get me wrong, I really like how mantras on FB work and I enjoy the charge management they come with. My post is about the need to recharge them every time you change maps or instances. Its a simple quality of life thing. Like yesterday, I died on a story mission because my mantras "suddenly" were not charged even though I charged them a minute earlier...

 

Seriously,

One great example of this is a certain fight against a certain person towards the end of the PoF story... If you die you can spawn again but are immediately fighting, you know how dumb it is to run around trying to prepare mantras? It seriously has to be at the top of dumb game mechanics...

 

They have been hard working on making changes though, so I imagine they will revisit this. but I won't stop expressing how horrible it is, until it is either changes, or I rage quit the game entirely.

[Skyline Crash.6254]

I think they should just remove the casting of mantras in general and just leave it as an ammunition system with a strong 3rd charge. Maybe increase the charge cd rate to compensate

[Xithryl.2807]

> @"Skyline Crash.6254" said:

> I think they should just remove the casting of mantras in general and just leave it as an ammunition system with a strong 3rd charge. Maybe increase the charge cd rate to compensate

 

That's what I'm thinking, preparing mantras is an empty choice, you don't ever NOT want them charged, its just an annoyance. Some argue that there is no counter play in PVP to activated mantras, but it is still an empty choice, I will just hide and activate them, or not engage until activated, but now as a Firebrand I'm not having fun cause stupid mechanics... It will change I can't see them leaving it.

[otto.5684]

It will be nice if they mantras are Stowed by default. Everytime you change instance, map go into water or die you have to restow them. And of course you cannot do while on mount. It is pretty lame in that respect. As for auto stow in combat, that it is a major design change. Not saying it is bad, but may require some rework.

[Korochun.5862]

Just give them 1/4s cast time and remove charge up. Done.

[Skyline Crash.6254]

> @Korochun.5862 said:

> Just give them 1/4s cast time and remove charge up. Done.

 

I personally love the instant cast. Not worth. Maybe just reduce the charge up time to 1 1/2 second or something

[Metavahn.7293]

god forbid you use more than 1 mantra, please change prep time to 1 second

[Aza.2105]

The only thing I hate is having to refresh them every time you change maps. Its ANNOYING.

[Brutaly.6257]

> @Korochun.5862 said:

> Just give them 1/4s cast time and remove charge up. Done.

 

And kill them totally due to bad effect/cast time ratio? This would effectively remove them for pvp and wvw. Tbh i wouldnt use them in pve either.

 

OP has a point, the initial charge isnt just a hazzle. in pvp you cant even get them ready in time (4 mantras) even with quickness when you move from spawn to the center point of the map. On some maps.

 

And it is bad design that you need to use cool downs in order to use cool downs, basically you use two different sources of quickness just to get your utilities up in time.

 

Let them recharge automatically on death and when swapping maps/sides in matches.

[Hee Haw.7164]

> @Xithryl.2807 said:

> > @"green plum.7514" said:

> > Again, don't get me wrong, I really like how mantras on FB work and I enjoy the charge management they come with. My post is about the need to recharge them every time you change maps or instances. Its a simple quality of life thing. Like yesterday, I died on a story mission because my mantras "suddenly" were not charged even though I charged them a minute earlier...

>

> Seriously,

> One great example of this is a certain fight against a certain person towards the end of the PoF story... If you die you can spawn again but are immediately fighting, you know how kitten it is to run around trying to prepare mantras? It seriously has to be at the top of kitten game mechanics...

>

That's the _entire point _of the prep mechanic. The downside of mantras is that the prep is an interruptible channel. If you die in a boss fight with an insta-res mechanic, you have to make a choice: do I jump back into attacking, but forgo my mantra, or do I spend 2.75 seconds avoiding knockbacks while I charge it, thereby giving myself an advantage throughout the fight? That's the opportunity cost. It gives counterplay, whether to a player or to a monster.

 

> @Xithryl.2807 said:

> > @"Skyline Crash.6254" said:

> >Some argue that there is no counter play in PVP to activated mantras, but it is still an empty choice, I will just hide and activate them, or not engage until activated, but now as a Firebrand I'm not having fun cause stupid mechanics... It will change I can't see them leaving it.

 

How it that an empty choice? In your examples, you are voluntarily taking yourself out of battle to charge a skill, and giving the opposing team a gift. When activated, a mantra is not interruptible, and can be used three times. The trade-off is the interruptible channel to charge it. If you hide to charge it, your decision to take yourself out of the fight is the counterplay.

[Brutaly.6257]

Recharging mantras when you resurrect or change map is indeed an empty and boring choice.

 

In foefire you need to use two charges of quickness so you have them all up before you reach the center. Cast skills in order to be able to use skills. It a theme for tomes as well since skill 5 in all tomes are mandatory in order to use the rest of the skills. Time to make some macros.

 

 

Just add 5s cd and begone with a boring mechanic and still have the same drawback.

[Xithryl.2807]

> @"Hee Haw.7164" said:

> How it that an empty choice? In your examples, you are voluntarily taking yourself out of battle to charge a skill, and giving the opposing team a gift. When activated, a mantra is not interruptible, and can be used three times. The trade-off is the interruptible channel to charge it. If you hide to charge it, your decision to take yourself out of the fight is the counterplay.

 

To be honest I was thinking more along the lines of, "oops I forgot to charge my stupid mantra's let me get out of combat to do so now" The problem is, the prep time and long CD after 3rd charge is used, are so bad, that no one is wanting to spend that 3rd charge. So we have a prep time for the hope that maybe it can be interrupted to stop a firebrand from using mantras, but the Firebrands already made the empty choice to activate them before the fight started.

 

If the sole reason to have an activation on mantra's is for PvP, they surely need to fix it, because the state it is in now, is pure headache for everything else.

 

At a minimum I can see them patching it so they stay activated on map change... At the least

 

[quaniesan.8497]

The worst part is they reset after you come out of water.

[Mithos.9023]

I always disliked mantras for the annoyance of charging them up. You have to recharge them so often it feels they do nothing than wasting your time, every map change you need a recharge, death you need a recharge, just logged in first recharge your mantras. I hoped with the ammunition system this would change but no. Now every ammo skill feels like what mantras were supposed to be and mantras feel like an inferior version.

 

My idea would be to change mantras to the following: You always have them loaded up by default. If you are in combat and used your last charge the mantra flips over to the loading skill. You now would have the options to either wait for the charges to regenerate or to use the recharge to load them up to the maximum. With that you would have the risk reward situation, using the charge up skill with the risk of being interrupted but gain immediate access to your mantra skills again.

 

There is one thing I am not sure. Should the mantra slowly charge like an ammunition skill when emptied and the recharge skill only be there until the first charge is recovered? The recharge skill would still distinguish the two skill types, but they would be quite close.

The other option I thought up was when a mantra is emptied the automatic recharge would need the combined time of all charges to restore the mantra. For example if a mantra had two charges with 10 seconds recharge once emptied, you wouldn’t get a charge after 10 seconds and it would need to charge up both charged so 20 seconds.

[RabbitUp.8294]

> @"Hee Haw.7164" said:

> That's the _entire point _of the prep mechanic. The downside of mantras is that the prep is an interruptible channel. If you die in a boss fight with an insta-res mechanic, you have to make a choice: do I jump back into attacking, but forgo my mantra, or do I spend 2.75 seconds avoiding knockbacks while I charge it, thereby giving myself an advantage throughout the fight? That's the opportunity cost. It gives counterplay, whether to a player or to a monster.

 

Yes, the downside is pretty obvious, what's the upside? When we have charge skills, even instant-cast ones, that don't have any initial cast, it gets hard to see what's the clear stregth of mantras that justifies this limitation.

 

The only difference between those skills are cooldown numbers, whether it's the cooldown between consequent uses of charges, recharge time of ammo, or the overall cooldown of mantras. But when even firebrand and mesmer mantras have wildly different numbers from each other, I don't see what makes those mantras, and what makes weaver skills stances.

[Hee Haw.7164]

> @RabbitUp.8294 said:

> > @"Hee Haw.7164" said:

> > That's the _entire point _of the prep mechanic. The downside of mantras is that the prep is an interruptible channel. If you die in a boss fight with an insta-res mechanic, you have to make a choice: do I jump back into attacking, but forgo my mantra, or do I spend 2.75 seconds avoiding knockbacks while I charge it, thereby giving myself an advantage throughout the fight? That's the opportunity cost. It gives counterplay, whether to a player or to a monster.

>

> Yes, the downside is pretty obvious, what's the upside? When we have charge skills, even instant-cast ones, that don't have any initial cast, it gets hard to see what's the clear stregth of mantras that justifies this limitation.

>

> The only difference between those skills are cooldown numbers, whether it's the cooldown between consequent uses of charges, recharge time of ammo, or the overall cooldown of mantras. But when even firebrand and mesmer mantras have wildly different numbers from each other, I don't see what makes those mantras, and what makes weaver skills stances.

 

I'd guess the intent for the difference between Mantra of Flame and say, Arcane Blast (also instant cast, 3 charge), is that Arcane Blast's charges are all the same, with 20s recharge, while Mantra of Flame lets you choose between cycling between the first two charges at at 15s recharge, or opting to pull the trigger on the more powerful third charge, but paying for that choice with a longer recharge and the need to re-channel the skill. Against a golem, the wisdom may be to never use the third charge, because sustained DPS is the name of the game, but in a competitive environment, there may be an advantage to using the third charge in a clutch moment that outweighs the cost of using it. To me, that makes for a more strategically interesting skill than Arcane Blast, even if I have to remember to hit "7" once when I load into a map.

[RedSemaphore.1489]

the cast time might be bearable if we don't lose prep due to swimming / zoning (coming from maining mesmer since launch)

[Mikeskies.1536]

Just pre-prepare them before you do anything. Once prepared, they only reset if you use all the charges.

[RabbitUp.8294]

Sure, the final charge is an interesting mechanic, but that's exclusive to FB mantras. Mesmer mantras get small bonus when prepared instead.> @Mikeskies.1536 said:

> Just pre-prepare them before you do anything. Once prepared, they only reset if you use all the charges.

 

Or if you die, change maps/instances, go underwater.

[Holgarf.6581]

> @"green plum.7514" said:

> A major annoyance with mantras is that they need to be prepared. I don't really see what this brings to the game mechanics-wise except being a major annoyance (e.g. whence forgets to recharge them before going into a fight). I really like the ammo mechanic and the "significant last charge" idea, since it forces you to make tactical decisions, but why can't the recharge happen automatically? Just let the skill go on longer cooldown after the last charge is used and then come back with three charges as the cooldown ends. The final result will be the same as with optimal play, but with one thing less to pay attention to...

 

I'd rather it be like this: If you've already prepared your mantras, they stay ready on map change if you still have those skills selected. As it currently happens, whenever I swap map, they're unprepared. I hate that because not even necro summons disappear on map change, so I'd very much like to see mantras behave the same way - if they do, then I'm cool with mantras. Other than that, they don't need much changing, although I'd like to see some minor changes to the healing mantra, which to me, is utterly useless... like 1500 heal per cast, which is so puny I just use something else to heal.

[Kanto.1659]

Having to re-set them up when we change maps, or enter a story mission, is bad.

[Saiyan.1704]

> @"green plum.7514" said:

> > @RabbitUp.8294 said:

> > FB mantras do the same on paper, but in reality, being instant-casts is wasted, because you have to reposition to hit your allies.

>

> BTW, Mesmer is different since their mantra preparation has an ability effect. Not so for FB, as far as I can see.

 

When charging your Mantra Heal you'll dish out a Smite Condition! So that's 2k heals and 2 Cleanses while you're out of combat and full health! XD!

[Pyroatheist.9031]

Not gonna lie, it's pretty amusing to see another class wrestle with the clunkiness that we've had to put up with since the beginning of the game.

 

In any event, mesmer mantras are best used in a build to add bits of potent utility or capability. It's not reasonable to actually build fully around a 4 (5?) mantra setup because the cast times begin to actively interfere with gameplay. A general rule of thumb is you stick to no more than 2 mantras for any given build setup. With 2 mantras you can rotate charging them fairly smoothly into normal play. Past 2 and you start to run into significant problems with clunkiness. 3 is allowable if all 3 mantras just perfectly fit what you need to do, but should be otherwise avoided.

 

We used to joke that there was no way another class would get mantras because Anet knew better than to inflict that sort of suffering on other folks. Honestly, the mantra implementation has gotten drastically better than it used to be, so they're actually usable in builds as long as you follow those guidelines.

[Ghotistyx.6942]

I ran a 4 Mantra build on mesmer a long time ago and stalemated a Hambow for over 5mins. We eventually just walked away.

Seeing both Memser and Guardian Mantras now, they're much better like Pyro said. You often don't want to run too many mantras because its likely they won't all actually add something to you build, let alone the additional management. That being said, Mantras offer a skill type that's clearly different to the rest, and I like what they offer thematically and mechanically.

>! And don't even get me started on Meditations. How do you meditate instantly? Meditations should've been the name for Guardian Mantras, or the opposite of instant cast like channeling.