Team Build: Dillway+Variants

If you want fall back, I'd probably go with one of the first builds I put up. Most likely the dual-smite variant. Also, what happened to the thread? Don't mind it, but 'twas odd seeing the 'team build' logo on it. It's appreciated nonetheless.

Wandering Eye is not strong. It's not bad, but it's not strong. Shared Burden is very weak. If you're using it for the interrupts, use Panic (which is itself rather bad, for casters at least). If you're using it for the snare, use Deep Freeze (lol?). If you're using it for antimelee, use Aegis. Using Illusion means you are speccing high into a weak attribute line, which in turn forces BiP support that means you lose out on stronger elites. I can see no reason whatsoever to use Illusion Mesmers in most areas.

If you're using five hard resses when you only need three (at most - I usually use two) then you are obviously sacrificing something. That's two skills on a hero that has already specced high into attributes that have plenty of good skills. I don't get it.

PS: This is in no way meant as derogatory to Plutoman, in case you're feeling offended! I'm just a highly offensive powerplayer who believes that good technique should be the first line of defense against teamwipes, not putting more defense into teambuilds. It may be just me, but I'm completely comfortable with a lot less defense than most people use. But I would still oppose using Illusion Mesmers at all, because there are better ways to stay alive + deal damage.

I entirely understand. Those builds are far from polished, it's something I threw together. I've been off doing too many other things to worry about Guild Wars so much (Skyrim, anyone?).

For the e-surge builds, a domination focus is most definitely ideal. For Fall Back, you *could* drop two of the illusion components, and use para skills - you might find it better to drop one illusion and one protection, though, and use some supportive para skills. I find the illusion line is extremely effective against anti-melee, and without a source of blind (even with a 50% block) the team gets torn up against a single warrior boss (ex, the one in vloxen's, backed by a healer) - the team can take down the healer within seconds, but that's enough time for a warrior boss to wreck the backline with 200-300 damage hits. A simple focus fire on the boss and it's dead quite fast due to the illusion lines - it also helps because melee's tend to ball around single critical targets together.

However, one thing I would entirely agree is running 16/11 with dom/illusion when using e-surge. There's no reason to keep illusion as high as 15 for two skills, both non-elites. SoA was used because I didn't have time to test variants, and it's a solid protection skill. Not many other basic options though that aren't energy heavy. Shielding Hands is the only major option I could see.

I typically keep fomf on the mesmers for fast rezzes, while keeping it disabled on the two healers just for a backup. That's force of habit from the DoA. Don't really need it for most play. :P Just like I tend to keep rebirth on my player character, though I never use it except in the DoA at times.

The main reason I like BiP is that you can afford to drop an entire attribute line on 3-4 characters for bringing it alone. I'd argue that the effectiveness of 3 extra secondaries open is worth the cost of BiP. Whether you use illusion is someone's choice - I could easily have dropped a dom mesmer for a prot, or anything else of the sort. Might be something I'll experiment with more in the future.

Last couple things - I will probably get EVAS at some point. It makes for an interesting play without it because I have no method of balling besides pulling effectively around corners. But, I'm not really playing GW too much, so it doesn't phase me at all. The ele's energy is usually decent - as in, it doesn't need the same amount of support the mesmers do. However, I'll point that using a rit secondary, if you want an invoke healer, you must avoid PwK. Kills the AI on it.

So, anyways, I'll be back to skyrim now. I hope anyone using these builds will take a bit of time to polish them (fixing the attributes and etc), but I'll probably be wrong in that count for at least 50% of the people who look here. :P Hope you enjoyed the builds, Jeydra, I assumed you might like the power builds much more than the originals (besides some of the issues I agree on). Much more your style, though they can hold relatively well against pressure too.

I would just like to say thank you for the thread and builds from several posts here. I've not played in four years and as I could not recover my account started from scratch. I've done all normal mode and just started HM and with the setups in this thread I have cleared a lot of vanquishing in Factions and HM missions in Factions, Tyria Vanquishing in 6-man areas without one healer and the elementalist and find it completely easy, have not wiped or had the team die yet even when I accidently overpulled when mobs appeared from above.

Currently playing a Dervish with the Assassin's Promise, Ebon Vanguard Assassin thing and two dwarven skills just to do a bit of damage or when bored.

So thanks!

I'm not sure how relevant to the thread the original posted builds are but if they are still relevant I have a couple of minor objections.

Your attribute speccing is less than ideal. Your elite illusion mesmers have 12+1 dom, 10+4 illusion, and 8+1 fast casting. These same attributes could be achieved with 11+2 dom 11+3 illusion and 8+1 fast casting by using dual major runes. This would give your heroes more life as dual majors is -70 whereas a superior is -75. 5 health is inconsequential? Maybe but majors are usually cheaper as well so I believe it is noteworthy.

Furthermore I can only assume it is a mistake but your monk has an extra point to spend on DF and your mes #1 and mes #3 have 2 points in communing that should be in resto.

His runes were updated to using +2 a while back on builds listed further in, like up the top post on this page. 5hp can be a lifesaver.

I see that in your original dillway you only dropped power spike for shatter enchantment in the melee player variant and the invoke variant. But in these newer builds you have done that in every version of dillway. Is that intentional, or just an accidental oversight?

An interesting 7 hero team build! This may be a dumb question, but I was wondering, for the 4-man/6-man areas (like to vanquish and do missions), which heroes should I bring? Based on the general build, I assume 1 mesmer, 1 BiP necro, and 1 RoJ monk?

1. Since heroes don't stack hexes, it is not as useful to bring multiple copies of the same hex, even though I like mistrust and wandering eye too. Having lower attributes than dom or illusion mesmers is a waste of energy.

2. Having a ST defensive rit run restore is not a good idea. In tough battles, the rit would be busy casting Shelter due to ST. This is what you need, but having fast recharging restore heals competiting for cast opportunities, during the same situations, is counter productive.

But since you have so much additional defenses, that slack is probably taken up.

3. The default build is too defensive, but I guess that depends on your playstyle. Having a screenshot with no skills on your player bar and completing city only serves to prove that the build is too defensive, as that would not be a typical situation for most players.

4. I doubt that your melee option has enough healing for the really tough areas. Your BiP restore necro is going to be really strained.

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I just thought of another problem with the build that is not so obvious, you have only 1 spirit (Shelter) without a SoS. This means that your MB&S would only remove 1 condition (not a big deal since you have other condition removers) and if Shelter dies in tough battles, Spirit Light would cost your healers additional life sac.

Again since you have additional defenses, the slack can probably be covered by your other defenses. But they are just inefficiencies with the build.