Guild Wars 2

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All done!

It looks decent, but feels unfocused.

It is a phantasm build, but lacks both traits to add damage for them, meaning our phantasms will hit 30% less hard than other phantasm builds. You also don’t have the cooldown trait for one of your phantasms.

Signet of domination really makes no sense in a phantasm build. Signet of illusions would synergize far better.

Interesting. You’re willing to sacrifice both 15% bonus damage traits from 25 Inspiration and Domination III (Empowered Illusions) for a brief period of Protection and Regeneration?

If I were to give up 10 Domination, it would be going into Duelist like so:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgQQNAW7alwzKqnUzpGa9IxZGQP6oUgdvXmBuzNA;TsAg1CnoixEjIGbMuYkxsiYQxmAA

You can swap Staff for Sword+Focus and move 5 points from Duelist to Inspiration for Warden’s Feedback. This is much more reliable mobility (and totally hoses ranged enemies).

@Pyroatheist
I am not a big fan of Signet of Illusions. I would advise him to protect himself rather than his Phantasms. ><

But you are absolutely right about the cooldown.

Valid points!, i do not think that switching from sword/pistol to staff, if that is what you meant is that good. The sword pistol combo has to much to offer.

My Phantasms will do less damage sure, but it’s not enough of a loss to outweigh what you gain in terms of survivability in my opinion, but that’s probably because it fits me better with my playstyle and our teams kind of style, where burst and loads of damage is less important than having a controlled fight, hence the signet.

I will however add the more damage focused spec to the guide aswell when i have time.

On the note of it being not very focused, well it depends on how you see it.
It is very focused on giving you the upper hand in every fight, and that is by having your Phantasms. You will be able to 1v1 just about everything when still having a very big impact in teamfights. It’s just not doing it by the Phantasms dmg output only, but buffing you aswell. Yet they still do plenty damage as they are!

Exactly what survivability do you gain?

My phantasm builds always include 25 points in insp, so they get aoe regen. Illusionary membrane is useless because you can’t control when the protection procs, so it is a completely random defense. The only defense you actually gain is the 3% less damage per illusion. That’s decent, but is it really worth losing 30% of your damage? I think not.

My phantasm build is 10/30/0/25/5, with sword/pistol and scepter/sword. The 2 best phantasms we have are pistol and sword, hands down for pvp. Zerker is unreliable, and warlock has a tendency to miss as well, since its projectile does not track. That weapon combo also provides blurred frenzy on 8s cooldown, and 2 blocks, each on around an 11 second cd. I take blink and decoy for stunbreaking defense. If I’m doing a 1v1, signet of illusions makes my phantasms extremely tough to kill. If I’m in a team for tPvP, I’ll take null field or portal.

It is the most overpowered dueling build I have ever seen or used, and I have not lost a 1v1 with it ever, not a single time. To my knowledge, there is no counter. It will rip apart glass cannons, chew through bunkers, and disregard conditions.

Keep Sword+Pistol; if you do Rampager, Scepter+Pistol is better, since you have equivalent damage at melee range and get the buffed Confusing Images. But if you’re going to focus on Duelists in PvP (which I recommend you do!), Sharper Images is key. High crit chance and a condition damage component will help. Duelist’s Discipline also lets you deploy your Duelists from 1200 range.

Survivability? Mesmers are inherently survivable. Sword+Focus gives you distortion, knock down, and swiftness. Scepter+Pistol gives you a block/blind and a stun. Staff gives you a backwards dash and boons literally on a stick. If anything, you can always run away.

In a Phantasm build, it’s all about buffing your phantasms. Virtually everything in your build should benefit them somehow. The only things to use for yourself pretty much should be your Sigil of Air and Runes for mobility.

The good thing about this game is that you can pretty much tailormake specs that reflects your playstyle, this suits mine quite perfectly and it works really well within the team.

I should probably have included more variations of the spec in the build, but then again that was not what it was for.

Thanks for the pointers tho!

This is true. I personally like running away. Sword+Focus and Scepter+Pistol for me. xD