This build solves a long-standing issue with Mesmers: the difficulty of bringing support skills from other professions without compromising their attribute spread. It also allows a Mesmer hero to bring any/all relevant support spells from other professions such as Splinter Weapon or Dark Aura to support melee/Soul Taker. Heroes use the skill surprisingly well, they immediately maintain it outside of combat and it has high priority in combat. Finally, the bar allows the hero to gain 33 energy every 12 seconds with Power Drain. Let me know if there are any additional optionals worth taking! WraithboundCA (talk) 00:11, 10 November 2022 (UTC)
My apologies, I'll add it to the See Also section. Funny enough that build page is what inspired me to test the idea on a hero in the first place. WraithboundCA (talk) 01:26, 10 November 2022 (UTC)
As a proof of concept I ran the entirety of DoA in NM with the below builds and was able to complete it in less than 2h without cons:
The run was quite successful, and the Mesmer bars functioned like typical Domination Mesmers while offering incredible support for the Soul Taker! WraithboundCA (talk) 06:45, 10 November 2022 (UTC)
I'd try arcane conundrum over power drain on that Me/Rt bar, but that's slightly off-topic; yesterday I only had time for a very superficial glance at the page and thought (based on the page name) that it's a player build. Now that I had time to actually read the article, things have cleared up. Hero builds need the suffix Hero in the page title, so we'll have to move this page accordingly. Are you fine with Build:Me/any Signet of Illusions Support Hero, dropping the Domination for the sake of brevity?
Regarding the optionals: (1) Thanks to signet of illusions any non-illusion spells can be best picks without regard for their attributes. Therefore I'd say that obsidian flame is obsolete due to chain lightning, as the latter provides area damage and has a shorter (!) casting time thanks to fast casting. Barbs is just an inferior version of order of pain in most cases, unless you're playing in a minion heavy setup or against massive enchantment removal (should at least be noted as such). (2) Mend Body and Soul/Spirit Light/Mystic Healing might burn through the signet charges too quickly. (3) Overcast build variants are odd without energy storage, especially all current overcast interacting skills from earth magic, as none of them interact with fast casting. (4) Maybe worth considering: Healing seed, scourge healing/enchantments, smite hex, masochism (hehe, finally a mesmer bone fiend minion master with 18 death magic), empathy, spirit of failure (as an anti-shiro variant without support, alongside price of failure and reckless haste and empathy), earthquake (instead of obsidian flame), stoneflesh aura (if there's any area where the team needs massive defense for whatever reason, don't put it on the page, just keep it in your head for some extremely odd and specific quests...), maelstroem, shroud of sorrow (see stoneflesh aura).
Regarding the main bar/build concept: Shatter Hex should only be a main bar skill if the player is in melee range. My take on Signet of Illusions support as a player was to have three core support skills that'll do well with a melee and constitute the basis for a variantbar: Dark Aura/Splinter Weapon/Strength of Honor. One of these combined with shatter hex would constitute the support character of the build, leaving the rest of the bar to utility, energy management and a best of raw mesmer power. This build is currently very, very broad with its general concept, including build variants that aren't support at all, i.e. Me/E focusing on DoTAoE or Me/N minion bombing or any secondary profession direct damage option. If such builds are worth featuring, a page split to signet of illusions caster and signet of illusions support might be the right course of action, featuring especially well-working derived build types as variantbars. The vast amount of optionals on the current page, including their lack of focus on the support role, risk reducing the value for users as they may not know what to do with such a broad concept. --Krschkr (talk) 17:30, 10 November 2022 (UTC)
For the optionals I simply wanted to add as many ideas as I could to whittle down with the community. If there is anything you don't feel belongs on the page then absolutely feel free to trim the excess. As for Arcane Conundrum, the hero won't cast it 90% of the time since the hero will not use Illusion Magic spells while affected by Signet of Illusions. Masochism won't adjust the Death Magic rank since the skills are being cast with Illusion magic sadly. I think the support variants are the most important, while also maintaining some of the more interesting options such as Heaven's Delight/Divine Healing, or Elementalist damage skills to replace things like Spiritual Pain. As for Healing Seed and the other Smite spells, I think they are probably very good ideas. Please feel free to adjust the page as you see fit! WraithboundCA (talk)
Ah, right... the attribute boost only works if it's towards illusion magic. What a shame. --Krschkr (talk) 18:50, 10 November 2022 (UTC)
I realize I forgot to comment on the potential of splitting the page: I think that’s likely a good idea. Starting with a purely support page is definitely the place to start, so perhaps on this particular page we focus on only the /Mo, /Rt, and /N variants? I think a Minion Bombing version would also be valuable as it works very similarly to the Keystone version while providing a higher Death Magic Attribute. Apart from that, I think the idea of a Caster version is a solid one, though I think it may end up limited to /E for things like Churning Earth, Earthquake, and Chain Lightning. Overall, I agree with pretty much all the critique you’ve provided above. WraithboundCA (talk) 23:55, 10 November 2022 (UTC)
It occurs to me that I'm not sure how to change the title of a build without creating a new page and deleting the current one. If you could help me out with that I would very much appreciate it. I'm going to trim a great deal of the optionals to keep it as strictly a support roll. WraithboundCA (talk) 22:29, 11 November 2022 (UTC)
It's done by moving the page (without leaving a redirect). I'm not entirely sure regular users can do that, so I'll go ahead and move the page. --Krschkr (talk) 23:03, 11 November 2022 (UTC)
Maybe adding enchantment removal would be a good idea as a different form of support against protection prayers and earth magic. Mirror of disenchantment against aegis, rend enchantments for anything else. --Krschkr (talk) 23:07, 11 November 2022 (UTC)
Good idea, I've added the suggested enchantment removal. Thank you for moving the page! As for all of the cut optionals, do you think there's value in creating a DPS caster version featuring some of the removed optionals? WraithboundCA (talk) 01:09, 12 November 2022 (UTC)
Inspiration Rune[]
I think this would be better as an Attunement rune (or if you don't need the energy, Vitae). The hero would have to use a non-SoI boosted Power Drain twice in order to see a net gain in energy, and the rune doesn't help reach a breakpoint for WN,WN or Drain Enchantment. Higher max energy would also increase the energy replenished by Power Drain when the hero uses it above 12 (40-33+5) energy. --Cealdor (talk) 09:42, 3 September 2023 (UTC)
Makes sense to me, feel free to update as you see fit! WraithboundCA (talk) 23:33, 4 September 2023 (UTC)
