Virtuoso changes for Beta 4 = damage reduction on most skills for PvE

[Simonoly.4352]

The passive restocking of blades outside of combat is nice, I guess, but I don't remember ever struggling to get enough blades in the beta so I'm surprised to see this change.

Additionally, being able to gain unblockable on the next bladesong with Psychic Riposte is a bit odd I must say - you can't really do anything to set this one up voluntary without, say, walking into damage on purpose to proc a block or evade. Seems like a very odd conditional. Also, I just don't really like this form of unblockable in general - I think the game is always healthier when unblockables are certain skills only so players get satisfaction from dodging an unblockable attack based on animation alone (nobody wants to be staring at an enemy tool tip all day).

I really appreciate the work Anet are putting into the expansion and the nice communication on this balancing for the beta, but I am starting to find the design of Virtuoso just a bit too confusing and, sadly, underwhelming.

Still looks nice though 😊

[Anthony.8056]

I along with other people didn't have a problem with getting blades when I played it in the first beta, so I was a little confused by that. The issues I noticed or saw were that the bladesongs were too basic and add nothing new to the spec other than the visual. They also had an activation time for no reason. Also, all the skills are projectiles which can cause this spec to be useless in all game  modes with a lack of unblockable. If anything, it needs to be more attainable throughout it's skills or traits. The lack of conditions and boons on this spec are underwhelming, just looking at the skill descriptions are so bare it's like looking at a blank white page. I'm talking about the weapon and traits not utilities but it's lacking there to.

 

I wish they would have given this spec double daggers to add some melee. It would have opened up more opportunities for this spec while solving some problems.

 

I see people already posting that unstable bladestorm should be aoe but I kinda like it as is. I actually like both ideas so maybe a trait that could change it to a ground target while giving it some benefits that would make you want take the trait.

 

 

 

 

 

[Mungo Zen.9364]

The damage doesn’t matter until it matters. This is a beta so, DPS isn’t as big a deal as say, the traits linking to skills correctly.  As someone else stated, the devs will tune the eSpecs to where they think they are balanced and then we, the players, can decide to play them, or complain about them  

Regardless of the viability of Virtuoso in Beta or EoD, in my opinion the play style is not fun. No number tweaks will fix my dislike of the eSpec, and really, that is okay (at least in my books).  I don’t know what profession or eSpec I will play on EoD but at this rate it may end up being Chrono for another expansion.

And I kinda wish that more folks had spent time hammering on the poor play style rather than the numbers. Count to 5 and pop…and that’s it….yippee. Mind you this is a game where only auto-attacking is sometimes the correct way to play…. so I don’t think the devs are overly invested in unique, interesting and engaging play for each eSpec. 

[Tseison.4659]

18 hours ago, AshkyLicious.4729 said:

So this is your reply to my previous post? 😂 Out of everything I wrote... Wow! Talk about ignoring the whole post. But I guess you dont have that much to say since you obviously have no experience in mesmers and the history of how Anet treats this class.

And for concepts being fixed and Anet not changing them after what people wants... well look at the other elites and all their changes they recieved for next weeks Beta. They actually LISTENED to the feedbacks players gave them for the other specs, and improved the specs alot. Stop spreading lies in your arguments, that just makes you look bad in every single way.

Will not go into any further discussion with you, cuz as other peeps has already said in the previous posts, you're an obvious troll in the mesmer thread.

Everyone just needs to ignore them because they've already been banished from the Mesmer threads to begin with and their opinions and trolling are not wanted and never will be. All they do is hang around in Gendarren Fields in game while pestering every profession thread contributing nothing relevant lol.😂

[Wielder Of Magic.3950]

 

Virtuoso got marketed (and this was confirmed on Teapot’s stream by CMC) as being ‘thé shatter spec, where we should shatter a lot more often’. Here is the thing: You don’t shatter more often. You shatter just as much as you would on other mesmer specs, for a very simple reason: DPS mesmers pretty much always shatter on cooldown. Virtuoso isn’t any different. You are limited by your shatter cooldowns, not by your resource (blade) generation.

 

In fact, Virtuoso shatter recharges are identical to base Mesmer and Mirage ones aside from F4, and largely identical to Chrono’s (aside from continuüm split and Chrono’s F2 having a larger cooldown). In the beta, Virtuoso rotations already made it shatter on recharge, just like the other specs. Also known as: It does NOT shatter more often at all, it shatters the exact same amount. This is why the buffs to blade generation in this second beta won’t matter all that much. We already shattered on recharge and are limited by cooldowns, not by resources ( If I shatter 5x for 25 blades putting it all on cooldown, it doesnt matter if I generate 25 or 100 blades, the amount of shatters stay the same).  But meanwhile Virtuoso shatters do less damage, are reflectable and have an activation time (where other Mesmer spec shatters are instant).

 

If you want this to become “the shatter spec” the shatters on Virtuoso need to change.  Shatters should either become unique (like how the F4 is basically a unique effect), get their recharges drastically shortened, all become ammo skills, or somehow remove the recharges completely from the F1 and F2 DPS shatters. Either by default, or for example by recharging the shatter you used by 20% for each blade hit. Give us a way to shatter more often, increased blade generation does nothing if we cannot use it.

 

This is aside from the issues that blades still have an activation time (which makes rotations clunky) and still suffer from being reflectable (that one trait change does NOT adress this unfortunately) or the plethora of other issues that are still unadressed (no way to keep enemies away or to escape yourself, still no engaging traits, still dead when a reflect happens) or even added (the PvE damage will drop by a lot, which hurts for a spec that aside from DPS does not bring anything new. sure, you have core mesmer support, but at that point your DPS drops even further for bringing it).

[Salt Mode.3780]

I also would like to add that while everyone seems to be captivated that Virtuoso got a unblockable, they also increased the ICD to 3 seconds which works terribly with Bladeturn Refrain which is Aegis on shatter. When you are dueling or roaming you are only going to get 3 seconds of unblockable on a 3 second cooldown so how many shatters are you realistically going to have for you to actually make it usable....?

[The Specimen.8973]

1 hour ago, Salt Mode.3780 said:

I also would like to add that while everyone seems to be captivated that Virtuoso got a unblockable, they also increased the ICD to 3 seconds which works terribly with Bladeturn Refrain which is Aegis on shatter. When you are dueling or roaming you are only going to get 3 seconds of unblockable on a 3 second cooldown so how many shatters are you realistically going to have for you to actually make it usable....?

Not to mention its unblockable that you only receive when placing yourself in harms way to proc it, which (as a ranged dps) you really shouldn't be doing if you're truly supposed to be a ranged damage dealer lmao

 

My idea was that the Virtuoso's Bladesong shatters should inherently be unblockable against enemies beyond 600 range from you. This would in turn make Virtuoso a reliable, projectile-based, ranged dps that can actually be at long range; while still retaining the counter play against Virtuosos by pressuring them within 600 range. This improvement would also mean the top line of block/dodge traits won't be nullified as they will be an option for those who either prefer the close combat or just want to be sure they have unblockable access while in close range.

 

This along with the Mental Focus trait being changed to a damage increase when you are BEYOND 600 range from your targets (Not WITHIN 600 range - I still have no idea why this has been made the way it currently is when this was clearly meant to be a ranged dps) could actually make Virtuoso feel like the ranged dps it's obviously supposed to be.

 

However, I'll also add that I would like to see additions of cripple and mobility to some of the skills to allow the Virtuoso to actually attempt to disengage, to create and to retain long range. I'm all for cripple being added to Rain of Swords and Bladestorm, as well as a 300-600 teleport/dash backwards to Bladecall!!!

Edited November 27, 2021 by The Specimen.8973

[OriOri.8724]

kitten changes, ANet clearly didn't listen to any actual feedback from the first beta. Like countless others have said, more blade generation doesn't address any of the design issues with virtuoso.

 

Bladesongs are still worse than core shatters in every single regard. There was no cast time reduction, no increase in blade speed, no making them be not projectiles by default (not even a trait to do that), no cooldown reductions to differentiate them from core shatters, absolutely nothing.

 

Dagger still has plenty of issues at range because of the design of its skills.

 

If they want it to be the shatter spec, they haven't done anything that supports that. The shatters are objectively worse than core shatters, and they are on the same CDs.

[Blood Red Arachnid.2493]

At this point I have no idea what Anet is thinking.  Virtuoso as a spec only has a use if it has higher flat damage than either Chrono or Mirage.  This is because Chronomancer does so many things and it so great at self buffing that it is ridiculous.  Mirage does a lot of condi damage and is nigh invulnerable.  As it stands now, the only reason to play Virt is if you want a simpler but less effective playstyle than either chrono or mirage.  This... is not a good selling point.

 

Anet should revert and lesson these damage reductions, or else Virtuoso is going to be a n00b spec that everybody yells at for being ineffective.  

Edited December 1, 2021 by Blood Red Arachnid.2493
proofreading

[Obliviscaris.6937]

Jesus Christ people on Reddit are praising it. 

I won't accuse them of smoking crack, it would be a disservice to actual crack smokers.

[SkinnyT.5382]

I'm fine with the changes made with the exception of the dps reduction in pve I don't get that nerf. The profession is fun to play.

[Levetty.1279]

13 hours ago, Obliviscaris.6937 said:

Jesus Christ people on Reddit are praising it. 

I won't accuse them of smoking crack, it would be a disservice to actual crack smokers.

People on reddit don't play Mesmer. It doesn't help that they are still eternally seething that Chrono was one of the only support specs before PoF and think Chrono's carrying their kitten through raids was worse for the game then Firebrand being meta defining in every single mode of the game.

Edited December 2, 2021 by Levetty.1279

[Shiyo.3578]

20 hours ago, Obliviscaris.6937 said:

Jesus Christ people on Reddit are praising it. 

I won't accuse them of smoking crack, it would be a disservice to actual crack smokers.

Reddit is known to be full of people paid to say positive things/spread positivity about games, or spam every website about how great their game is(see: FF14).

Edited December 2, 2021 by Shiyo.3578

[Infusion.7149]

Nothing has really changed in competitive modes so if you are playing in raids specifically you might run virtuoso for phased fights (i.e. conjured amalgamate, keep construct, vale guardian, adina) due to the stocking blades. For fractals I can't see this being used outside of low tier fractals, axe mirage is more effective against bosses due to how ambushes work as well as exposed. For strikes in particular I don't see why I would run this over alacrity mirage , StM chrono/pChrono , or axe mirage.

In competitive modes the unblockable should have been 100% of the time on bladesong dissonance which is meant as a CC skill. Since that has 1.0 coefficient it wouldn't matter even if the damage was reduced to 0.01 coefficient in competitive modes : the scaling with blades purely exists for daze duration. If it isn't made unblockable perhaps it can fire blades that do 0.5s daze per blade meaning if someone has aegis it cuts right through aegis (on firebrands , core guardian in PVP, and now bladesworn) or attack based blocks such as catalyst's immutable stone , condi mirages using scepter's illusionary counter, shield of wrath on guardian, or protector's strike on guardian mace. This way it scales with blades better similar to how core mesmer gains extra value from clones beyond CC duration. From my testing even with multiple blades all it does is hit once with Bladesong dissonance currently which means you waste a 38s cooldown and all blade damage for possibly no damage or CC whatsoever if blocked. In PVE , up to 5 dazes would also mean it is almost as strong CC-wise as Darkrazor's daring on renegade while maintaining a far higher cooldown, which is the typical comparison for PvE defiance bar levels.

Speaking of unblockable, having unblockable occur on psychic riposte only after block/dodge is quite unwieldy. I'm not sure how to streamline it since you don't have block unless using sword offhand on dagger mainhand ; scepter mainhand is mainly condi and projectile to begin with so I don't think you'd run scepter at all unless it's for dueling 1v1 or something akin to that. From testing it appears to work with the evade "blur" on sword mainhand so while the damage is poor on sword mainhand the mobility improvement on sword 3 and the ability to prep an unblockable bladesong could work with a build that tries to replicate core shatter mesmer (scepter has a channel time and Greatsword is less reliable due to using phantasmal berserker for damage).
---> Maybe it is workable in PVP in the hands of extremely skilled players that are willing to put in the effort to make virtuoso better than core shatter mesmer. However, in WVW where reflects are rampant and even the "PVE mobs" such as veteran protector or the earth elementals have random reflects (which is key because it isn't a block it's a reflect) it is quite annoying that most of the damage is from projectiles.

In WVW rain of swords does far less than well of suffering which is unblockable on necromancers or shredder gyro (yes I know it's melee)  on scrappers. Why is this? I don't think you'll use rain of swords in PVP at all because you'll need sustain utilities / stunbreak and in PVE the damage is split. It can probably be unsplit from PVE now after the PVE damage dropped and use 0.8 coefficient in all modes per tick with no major adverse effects. The swords raining down animation is so huge and pink it is nearly impossible to miss it unless you are visually impaired to the point of near blindness whereas well of corruption merely has a ground effect with a black puddle in the middle.

Unstable bladestorm (dagger 3) is still slow as molasses with a huge tell. Unless cast at nearly point blank range I doubt it will hit anything that is a live player.

The damage nerf to bladecall was probably warranted when accounting for point blank range in PVE as it is low cooldown and does a great portion of the overall damage. However , reducing PVE autoattack damage on flying cutter is baffling to me, as it hurts the casual players the most as opposed to people that benchmark. In addition , despite the autoattack on greatsword being slow it still has more pressure than flying cutter in WVW settings because it isn't projectile.

Edited December 2, 2021 by Infusion.7149