Condi Virtuoso help

[Snorkar.9048]

I’m making my own condi virtuoso build to understand more the class. I have the doubt of using Chaos instead of Illusions or Dueling, the weapons I had more fun playing with are Dagger/Pistol/Torch, what would you think? I’m more of casual pve player and more wvw player

[mungozen.2379]

This post is a few months old but it covers all the basics of the Chaos Illusions Virtuoso I run in OW.  Illusions is probably required for OW Virtuoso as the trait Maim the Disillusioned is about 10% of your total DPS.  As well the Trait Shatterstorm is very strong as most of the time you will have F1 Bladesong Harmony on cooldown even with the 2 ammo count.

[Suyheuti.1732]

To be honest, as a mesmer main, any of condi virtuoso specs are not fun to play. For me, I have much more fun while playing chrono or mirage. In OW, I play chrono and enjoying. In WvW, power mirage is extremely fun for me. I only play power virtuoso in instanced contents which require power damage. 

[Snorkar.9048]

25 minutes ago, Suyheuti.1732 said:

To be honest, as a mesmer main, any of condi virtuoso specs are not fun to play. For me, I have much more fun while playing chrono or mirage. In OW, I play chrono and enjoying. In WvW, power mirage is extremely fun for me. I only play power virtuoso in instanced contents which require power damage. 

I understand your opinion and thanks for that, I like condi virtuoso because of the skills but maybe other elite can also be good, How would othe elites be visble as condi and hitting from as far as possible?

[Suyheuti.1732]

50 minutes ago, Snorkar.9048 said:

I understand your opinion and thanks for that, I like condi virtuoso because of the skills but maybe other elite can also be good, How would othe elites be visble as condi and hitting from as far as possible?

 

The only viable condi spec is Mirage except Virtuoso. If you ask in WvW, gs/s-p power mirage is viable and you know gs has 1200 range and mirage's gs ambush is awesome with infinite horizon train. It hits multiple target. For roaming and in PvP, mostly I use staff/axe-torch (I sneak in tower and I can kill tower's lord alone.) 

Edited August 29, 2022 by Suyheuti.1732

[Delta.1526]

Condi Virtuoso has a bit of a problem with uh, 3 specialization syndrome; there's a bunch of cute options for you in Chaos, but Duelling and Illusions synergize so well with each other and the elite spec that it's hard to justify dropping either of them. The condi traits in Virt revolve around Bleeds, with Bloodsong increasing their base damage, Jagged Mind outputting them with Blade attack crits and Fury being more effective on you -- so you really want to take Duelling which makes your illusions apply bleeds on crit, passively gives you Fury when you crit, makes crits hit harder and gives your phantasms fury so they can crit more. You also want to prioritize phantasms that strike multiple times to maximize this; Warden from Focus strikes 12 times, Swordsman and Duelist from Sword/Pistol offhand strike 8 times. The usual go-to for Virt is Focus and Sword, but Pistol has the highest theoretical amount of bleeds due to Duelist's Discipline but you're sacrificing Phantasmal Fury to take that, which means they'll crit less -- it's fun, though.

 

Bloodsong also generates blades as you bleed targets, which means you can use Bladesongs really often; so often that you can often find yourself with all your Bladesongs on cooldown, even if you take Signet of Illusions to refresh them all. You want to be using a Bladesong every 5 seconds for the damage buff from Deadly Blades, and Illusions provides you with an extra charge for your F1 and a shorter cooldown on all of them, letting you keep firing off Bladesongs without any downtime. 

 

Chaos is an attractive option, because it has condi damage and duration bonuses, but if you were to replace Illusions with it you'd be losing the +10% damage buff from Compounding Power and no longer having Maim the Disillusioned and Cry of Pain applying Torment/Confusion. You'd also be using Bladesongs less often, losing the +5% damage buff from Deadly Blades and getting less mileage out of Jagged Mind. If you replaced Duelling with Chaos instead, you'd do less power damage with crits, your phantasms would crit less and they wouldn't be applying bleeds when they did; meaning that you wouldn't be generating enough blades to fully use the additional Bladesongs from Illusions. This is still a better option than losing Illusions, and has a much simpler rotation as your phantasms aren't contributing to the gameplan. Dagger/Torch works great with this. 

[Salt Mode.3780]

Dropping illusions over chaos is a sure dps loss, however in rare cases you can drop dueling for chaos. 

Edited August 31, 2022 by Salt Mode.3780

[Eekasqueak.7850]

I like to use illusions/dueling with sword and focus off hands.