What do you think Anet's plan is for 90% of the unused game?

[Raye]

Fae, you're freaking me out. It's like you and I are the same person or something. >___>

The only thing to add about the greatsword that Fae didn't mention is that the 4th skill (the phantasm) actually does quite a lot of damage. It's the first thing I pop when I get in range.

Also the sound of the laser drives me off the wall. Seriously, who thought of putting that sound in?

[nkuvu]

Personally, I like the staff a fair bit. Even though I am in agreement about the skill 2 random teleport. Many staff mesmers may be familiar with the land of Teleportasia -- that place underneath it all. I spent a fair bit of time there before it was patched. And still get stuck in scenery when I use the skill. Or I teleport backwards to a cliff, and not realizing that I'm on a cliff, strafe a bit and... oh. Right. Bleh.

Greatsword is fine if I can stay back a bit, but it feels like the damage of the skill 1 drops off hugely if I'm too close. Which means that against Risen, greatsword drives me batty (the push back from the skill 5 works well enough, but then the Risen say "but! I love you! I want hugs!" and run right back up to me).

Staff does seem to be a bit slower to kill things, due in part to the random conditions from skill 1 (whee, forty stacks of vulnerability and my floating butterflies hurt the enemy just a little bit more! Now if I could only proc some burning on there...).

But out of the weapons available, I still run staff/greatsword on my mesmer. They're the best of the weapons available, because I really don't want a light armor melee class.

[Alaris]

The knockback is fun, of course... the AoE ground stab, I guess I need to use it better. Clones and phantasms you find on any set... the thing is that both dual sword (or sword+anything) as well as staff has clones stacking a condition, whereas greatsword clones seem to do nothing? The lazer noise does not bother me, then again I tend to put the volume low and not be bothered by stuff.

My favorites so far are staff and dual sword. Staff teleports you directly away from your foe, so I tend to run towards my foe a bit before hitting the skill, so it's easy to know where I will be. Sword is a very hit & run weapon.

[Fluffball]

I'm with Alaris, I don't think the GW is the greatest weapon. On the other hand I'm with Alaris that all weapons are good.

Alaris knows all.

[Alaris]

Yeah, it's pretty amazing that you can take any weapon set, and actually find a use for it where it's pretty much the best choice. Scepter has been great in some solo fights.

[BladeDVD]

& most of BladeDVD (so why the dvd?)

I used to help admin a DVD discussion forum and I collected them (over a 1,000 discs, they take up part of a wall in my living room) until blu ray came out. When I sign up on new sites, I try to use Blade, but it's usually taken (as it was here) and so I just added on DVD as it was the first thing to come to mind and it had taken up so much of my time since about 1999.

"Build" includes main/off-hand items, yes?
What if I do care for efficiency, but don't care for constant weapon switching? Then I get no defense skills apart from utility, unless my chosen weapon(s) include them.
Having the option to chose a few skills from a pool would also reduce the problem of bad builds, without forcing people to use specific weapons just to defend themselvs.

I guess for me, I just accept weapon skills/switching as being similar to chess and how each piece has its movement rules. If I want my knight to be able to move diagonally 3 spaces over other pieces, then I'm not really playing chess anymore. I mean, of course you can objectively argue whether the GW2 system is better or worse than any other system you might use, but unlike, for example, complaining about how easy/hard/AI quality a dungeon path is/has, there's zero change for change of such a basic mechanic. And you can't deny that it certainly has its benefits.

*good great sword post*

I go GS and s/focus on my mesmer. I don't like the staff because it's damage seemed too random and unpredictable. I liked the GS because they seemed to offer decent and reliable ranged damage options (I don't really notice the noise from skill 1, also, frickin' laser beams! lol). Then I traited for retaliation when I hit F2 and go in and use the melee range sword skills when I have a few phantoms up. I need to check out those confusion builds though. They sound like good damage.

[Alaris]

I might use greatsword more often in WvW... Because there, it pays to be able to hit foes at a long distance. Not sure what my other set might be.

In PvE though, so far it's staff & dual sword for me.