Build talk:Team - 3 Hero Dual Mesmer

Domination Mesmer
I've been testing the this build as a caster, and I've had a lot of success. However, I think the domination mesmer would be stronger if it were run as an Esurge over a Keystone Signet mesmer:

I ran through the 4-man standardized testing areas several times with both variants. In both areas, the Esurge mesmer showed significantly higher damage share compared to the keystone mesmer. Using GWToolBox, the Esurge variant had a damage distribution of roughly 40-35-25-0 (player, Esurge, inept, emo), and the keystone variant had a damage distribution around 50-20-30-0. This is consistent with other testing of the keystone signet mesmer I've been doing previously in 8-man areas -- it's damage is consistently inferior to that of an Esurge by a significant margin. --Xanshiz (talk) 04:05, 29 September 2019 (UTC)
 * I had similar results with energy surge vs. keystone signet and picked the signet variant as it provides a bit more stability (in particular against Naga) and some players need that. This was made with players in mind who don't have a dervish's sustain and no access to SY either and might even be bad at dealing damage, such as melee rangers and bow rangers. If you found that energy surge provides consistently better results I won't oppose a change. But you should ask Haquillo about his opinion, since he also submitted a vote. And you should make drain enchantment a variable skill that is dropped in factions due to general lack of enchantments. Spiritual pain! There are spirits and single targets. In theory you could even drop leech sig for flesh of my flesh and bring blood ritual on the ineptitude mesmer, but that'd be a major change that'd require more additional testing. --Krschkr (talk)
 * I agree with modifications to the Dom bar I posted, that's just what I used during the tests. Perhaps list both Keystone + Esurge? Might there be certain areas where one is preferred over the other? --Xanshiz (talk) 21:56, 30 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Keystone would be preferable in places with balling casters, so the Naga and to a lesser extent crimson skull aswell as some charr groups. But I don't think that we need to list both. It's either one or the other, let's try to keep the page as simple and approachable as appropriate. --Krschkr (talk) 00:21, 1 October 2019 (UTC)
 * I did another round of tests, and I couldn't help but reach the same original conclusion that Esurge outperformed Keystone, even against Naga. The fact that keystone signet doesn't affect the primary target weakens it a lot in lower party size areas compared to 8-man areas. Esurge damage was consistently higher, and I noticed no loss in stability when running it. I would propose a bar something along the lines of this:
 * Where the optionals could be Mistrust, Empathy, Shatter Hex, Spiritual Pain, or Drain Enchantment. --Xanshiz (talk) 22:49, 4 October 2019 (UTC)
 * I have notified Haquillo of this discussion. --Krschkr (talk) 00:24, 5 October 2019 (UTC)
 * I'm hoping to revisit this point since Haquillo seems to have been inactive recently on PvX. --Xanshiz (talk) 20:59, 20 October 2019 (UTC)
 * If Haquillo shows up that'll be great. Else I'm ready to assume that he wouldn't disagree with the change of one build to a similar one with the same functionality. Although I'd love to keep all votes fitting and meaningful that shouldn't lead to stasis. In that case it'd even be better to remove a vote that (presumably) no longer fits. But I don't expect that to happen in this case.
 * On a side note: I have a bit more spare time again and already prepared new tests on this matter and the newly submitted 3 Hero Balanced. --Krschkr (talk) 21:10, 20 October 2019 (UTC)
 * So I've been testing this team for a few hours, and I also have to agree with taking an ESurge over keystone. ESurge reliably outdamaged the inept (not that much for the ascalon testing, because the grawls don't really favor that bar). Keystone seemed to be really inconsistent in damage. I didn't notice increased stability with Keystone. The emo works quite well in the prophecies areas, but I did see some issues in factions. It was not unlikely that someone got spiked because he didn't have a prot. The team felt quite inconsistent there (both with keystone and esurge variant), but I think that can be negated with playing more carefully and flagging a bit (I just kinda c-spaced without microing anything). I suggest
 * I used Empathy and Drain Ench (might not be the best choice, only a few enchants in prophecies areas) in prophecies, and Shatter Hex and Leech Signet in factions. I would definitely take a 2nd ress. Player bar used: OwFiIxjMB+oUYUEmFVUDq/sICA ZStepmother (talk) 12:40, 19 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Since noone is replying, I'm going to edit the page soon (unless people disagree here). Since both me and Xanshiz have better results with esurge, and krschkr seems to be neutral on the matter, I think we have enough people in favor of the change. ZStepmother (talk) 14:39, 23 January 2020 (UTC)
 * The only areas with Grawls are Regent Valley, Eastern Frontier, and The Great Northern Wall (mission), and I think these are the only areas where Empathy and a second Drain Enchantment is justified. For all the other areas (proph and factions, idk yet about NF), I would recommend Leech Signet and Shatter Hex. ZStepmother (talk) 11:29, 9 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Reduced KSS to a variant, energy surge is now the main bar. I've picked drain enchantment for prophecies for the moment (don't forget about shield of judgment, it's not just healing hands) and leech signet for the others. Shatter hex is the other optional with spiritual pain as the variant for factions. Dual resurrection is now mainbarred. I personally had more stable gameplay with KSS than energy surge when I did new tests, but I couldn't get into enough detail to justify voting against the change. --Krschkr (talk) 01:38, 13 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Reduced KSS to a variant, energy surge is now the main bar. I've picked drain enchantment for prophecies for the moment (don't forget about shield of judgment, it's not just healing hands) and leech signet for the others. Shatter hex is the other optional with spiritual pain as the variant for factions. Dual resurrection is now mainbarred. I personally had more stable gameplay with KSS than energy surge when I did new tests, but I couldn't get into enough detail to justify voting against the change. --Krschkr (talk) 01:38, 13 February 2020 (UTC)

E/Mo
I find that Draw Conditions over shielding hands is pretty necessary as a melee player; of which I'm sure that the reply to my point will be "USE IAU & ASURAN SCAN!", of which you would probably be correct in saying...Willarddog (talk) 07:37, 29 March 2020 (UTC)
 * You guess it right, just run IAU and AScan. You don't have any reason to not run them On top of that, Shielding Hands (or Shield of Absorption), are very important for reducing damage, and you'll die much more without them. ZStepmother (talk) 09:31, 29 March 2020 (UTC)
 * I'd also strongly advise against bringing draw conditions on the E/Mo. It'd be easier to squeeze purge conditions into one of the mesmer builds. --Krschkr (talk) 01:22, 30 March 2020 (UTC)