Guild Wars 2

Is there any viable PvP or WvW build which doesn’t force me to destroy all of my clones and phantasms? I would like to keep them alive as long as possible, max their dmg and make them more survivable. I would like to find a way to always have atleast two of my illusions fighting on my side. I just want to try something completely new

bhagwad has been having some decent success with his phantasm build:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/My-No-Shatter-Mesmer-Build/first#post5397809

Note that it’s suboptimal in general, but not so much that you can’t have success. It has the advantage of coming at people so sideways that the noobs still think he’s running PU or condi mes.
You can even do a little better than he does, since he actually refuses to shatter entirely, while I imagine you’ll still be willing to shatter when the need arises.

If you can wait until HoT, chronomancer has some possibilities to mesh both playstyles.

There’s also potential for lockdown builds that don’t shatter a ton, though I’ve never built one myself.

As far as clones, they don’t deal damage. So there is only one possible reason you wouldn’t want to shatter them: conditions. Staff clones have a 33% chance on hit of applying a bleed, 33% chance of applying a burn, and their attacks bounce so you can hit the same target twice in many situations. Scepter clones apply torment with each attack. If you have Dueling, all clones apply bleeds on crit (at your base crit chance).

I play a rabid condi build in pvp and wvw (heavy PU in wvw) that mixes the clone-condi build with the shatter-condi build, so I can bleed-bomb enemies when I have some space from them, and confusion/torment shatter burst them when I don’t. It’s very fun, and has few solid hard counters (condi necros, diamond skin eles, condi thieves), but is less effective in group play above a 3v3 (you start to get a lot more group cleanses at 4v4 and above, though in WvW most people don’t understand that, so you can punch way above your weight there).

Lastly, there are a number of boonshare builds, designed to support teams by using Signet of Inspiration and its Inspiration-line partner trait to share large amounts of boons with your team. Inspiration has some decent aoe cleanse and healing as well, and many people have had success in group play. Not that they don’t shatter, but it’s not important to them. I mention it last because it wouldn’t be using your phantasms for dps the way you seem to want.

Summon phantasms, wait for cooldowns to reset, shatter them for damage (or auxilliary effect) and resummon.

There’s no good reason to let illusions die anymore without shattering them unless they are killed by an enemy.

I personally don’t believe in these being exclusive playstyles anymore – rather shatter skills and phantasms should both be made use of in any build for whatever purpose they have been traited/geared for.

Thx, guys, that’s very helpful I will give this phantasm build a try.

Just to add, pretty much any “Phantasm build” should utilize traits that allow more phantasm summons due to shattering.

How you parse out the rest of the build is the big riddle.