Ineptitude Axe Mirage Guild Wars 2 pvp Guide
Literally the Spider of Team fights, Mirage have a knack for stepping in and devastating foes before they even realize what has happened. This Mirage is focused on eliminating targets that are low, between interrupts, conditions, and burst damage and then escaping with their teleports, stealth, and misdirection.
This Mirage build focuses on getting high stacks of confusion and torment while blinding enemies and disorienting them.
Build Playstyle: Teamfight Assassin, Roamer
This Mirage build focuses on isolating weak targets and finishing them before they have an opportunity to retaliate. They operate as a teamfight assassin hopping in and out with their deception skills and using stealth to escape. They also function exceptionally well as a side node roamer offsetting duels at key moments.
This Mirage build does not have a lot of sustain so dueling usually isn’t its strong suit. This means picking your fights carefully and focusing weaker targets who have less defensives.
Skills
The Ineptitude Mirage plays similarly to the power block axe carrion mirage with a few exceptions. For your heal skill, we go with False Oasis for two reasons, one being able to grant mirage cloak a few seconds after use but also being a deception skill. In our mirage traitline we choose self deception which grants another clone while using a deception skill IF we have one active already.
Blink is your main disengage or distance cover ability. It also is great because it breaks stuns! Useful in a number of situations.
Mirage Advance is your primary engage tool as it gives you a window to teleport to your target, get your full damage combo off then teleport out before they can retaliate. The retreat portion helps escapes if you do get focused.
Signet of Midnight is an offensive and defensive tool. It is a stun break and grants stealth, however due to the grandmaster trait Ineptitude, the blind also applies stacks of confusion. This is your primary stunbreak and escape tool so i’d recommend using it defensively primarily.
Lastly, Jaunt being your short range teleport that removes a condition and applies confusion to the target. This also being a deception skill will give you more illusions if you have one active!
Traitlines
The Traitlines of the mirage are Dueling, Illusions, and of course Mirage. Illusions and Mirage are identical to power block Mirage in the sense that they fo us on improving shatters and the general improvements to the Mirage Cloak.
The Dueling line is where we spec into Ineptitude as a grandmaster trait. As well as Blinding Dissipation and Duelist Discipline. This improves pistol damage and abilities while giving us a blind on shatters 2, Cry of Frustration which in turn applies Confusion!
Amulet, Rune, and Sigils
The Amulet choice for this build is Wizard Amulet. I prefer this one as it adds some extra pressure with critical hits at the sacrifice of some HP when compared to the Carrion Amulet. The Carrion Amulet is still a viable choice but your critical hit chance stays lower.
Rune of the Lynx is a fantastic choice when it comes to this build due to the hybrid damage pressure paired with the extra movement speed. This is the only recommended choice due to the lack of movement enhancing effects with the rest of the build.
The sigil choices mainly pick energy as the synchronization with Mirage Cloak being integral to the build. For the axe/pistol combination I suggest sigil of doom as the extra poison healing reduction plays a great role at finishing foes, or hiding your more powerful conditions underneath the weak poison condi. The sword/torch combo works great with an extra bit of cleansing but can also be used with Sigil of Exposure to get some vulnerability stacks.
Gameplay
So knowing where you are best suited to be is the hardest curve to learn with the Mirage. Because you have a powerful burst and strong lock down capabilities with your dazes and control, you are a valuable asset to target foes who are under pressure.
In the above image, being the ideal situation is that you can either patrol home and mid looking to overwhelm targets or at least harass until your team can support. Or if your team is pressuring far node, you have the capabilities of decimating a singular target either already in trouble or who is unaware of your location.
In less ideal situations where you are against a two cap, you have to options. First option is to push with your team to decap mid or at least pressure mid. The second option which maybe more ideal is to travel to far node and decap. It depends on the flow and the matchup that you may face. You have significant mobility so focus on what may be best in the situation.
In even less ideal situations, you can be triple capped and need to make a choice. Similar to the two cap, you can try to slip by and decap nodes either at far, or mid if possible. Keeping an eye out for enemy players that are downed may make your decision easier as it would be better suited to attack with your team at the home node to regain control.
Gameplay videos
I’ve been playing this build on stream recently with a new video coming soon! The link below will take you to my most recent Mirage Stream. Aside from the hiccup in the second match…..
