Self Healing is horrible on Virtuoso. Here's Why

[SeTect.5918]

I m not quite sure if OP meant self-heal/defense or ally-heal.

But I kinda agree that virtuoso has far less solo defense than mirage and chrono in PvE.
Mirage has dodge spam and is invulnerable for a lot of time of the fight. It also has access to perm self-regen due to Renewing_Oasis.
Not to mention the heal skill regens 10k hp with cele gear while the heal skill (signet) on virtuoso is sacrificed to spam illusions to deal more damage, without the signet the damage is even lower than already (when playing solo) because virtuoso has almost no boons in solo play.

Virtuoso also has no clones which means the boss will always go 100% on you while bosses often focus your clones on mirage (and chrono, but those of normally instantly shattered).
The low defense virtuoso has access to comes from traits, which would be Bladeturn_Refrain, Jagged_Mind and Duelist's_Reversal.

• Bladeturn_Refrain sound kinda good at first, but every enemy that attacks more than every 3 seconds easily gets through the aegis and kills you kinda fast due to lack of self-heal because you can only choose Bladeturn Refrain OR Jagged Mind. Without "Jagged Mind" you also lack bleed generation to keep up enough blades to spam shatters to get enough aegis.
• Jagged_Mind is kinda good actually. necros condi to heal trait is at 5% and this one at 3% while virtuoso is in far big need or self-heal in PvE tho. Plus condi Virtuoso deals far more % of power damage compared to lets say mirage due to virtuosos need of a crit chance of 100% in PvE to keep up as much bleeding as possible. Virtuoso has around 70% of its damage being condi. So only 3% of 70% is converted to healing.
• Duelist's_Reversal is kinda useless in PvE due to having to evade an attack to trigger this. The duration of the boons is also kinda low for having to evade an attack to trigger this with a cooldown of 3 seconds. Not gonna lie, I m for a full rework of this trait like giving the same boons per blade spent but on a lower duration which would make the boons perm but only for yourself (Chrono also has access to perma quickness and 25 might due to choosing illusions instead of domination).

Virtuoso lacks the self-defense and self-boons to perform well in solo play and thats my issue with it, I always switch to Mirage or Chrono when I want to solo a champion in open world.

Virtuoso lacks damage reductions (maybe protection), might, regen and some self-heal to be effectile in solo play. Some self-quickness or self-alac would be nice too since chrono and mirage both have access to it too.
You could go Chaos to get protection on shatter but the duration is far too low to keep it up. You also cant keep up regeneration to keep up the 250 concentration and expertise trait.

The defense that comes with core is very low because mirage gains its defense by dodging.
So giving core good defense abilities means mirage would also get these, but mirages defense is so good already that it would make mirage far too op by giving core extra defense.
The problem this causes:
Virtuoso and Chrono both have to give defense via their e-spec traits, but they give none, thats why mirages defense is so good but chronos and virtuosos defense is slacking so hard. Well chrono has at least clones, but virtuoso doesnt even have that.

Edited December 28, 2023 by SeTect.5918

[Mell.4873]

On 12/28/2023 at 1:36 PM, SeTect.5918 said:

I m not quite sure if OP meant self-heal/defense or ally-heal.

But I kinda agree that virtuoso has far less solo defense than mirage and chrono in PvE.
Mirage has dodge spam and is invulnerable for a lot of time of the fight. It also has access to perm self-regen due to Renewing_Oasis.
Not to mention the heal skill regens 10k hp with cele gear while the heal skill (signet) on virtuoso is sacrificed to spam illusions to deal more damage, without the signet the damage is even lower than already (when playing solo) because virtuoso has almost no boons in solo play.

Virtuoso also has no clones which means the boss will always go 100% on you while bosses often focus your clones on mirage (and chrono, but those of normally instantly shattered).
The low defense virtuoso has access to comes from traits, which would be Bladeturn_Refrain, Jagged_Mind and Duelist's_Reversal.

• Bladeturn_Refrain sound kinda good at first, but every enemy that attacks more than every 3 seconds easily gets through the aegis and kills you kinda fast due to lack of self-heal because you can only choose Bladeturn Refrain OR Jagged Mind. Without "Jagged Mind" you also lack bleed generation to keep up enough blades to spam shatters to get enough aegis.
• Jagged_Mind is kinda good actually. necros condi to heal trait is at 5% and this one at 3% while virtuoso is in far big need or self-heal in PvE tho. Plus condi Virtuoso deals far more % of power damage compared to lets say mirage due to virtuosos need of a crit chance of 100% in PvE to keep up as much bleeding as possible. Virtuoso has around 70% of its damage being condi. So only 3% of 70% is converted to healing.
• Duelist's_Reversal is kinda useless in PvE due to having to evade an attack to trigger this. The duration of the boons is also kinda low for having to evade an attack to trigger this with a cooldown of 3 seconds. Not gonna lie, I m for a full rework of this trait like giving the same boons per blade spent but on a lower duration which would make the boons perm but only for yourself (Chrono also has access to perma quickness and 25 might due to choosing illusions instead of domination).

Virtuoso lacks the self-defense and self-boons to perform well in solo play and thats my issue with it, I always switch to Mirage or Chrono when I want to solo a champion in open world.

Virtuoso lacks damage reductions (maybe protection), might, regen and some self-heal to be effectile in solo play. Some self-quickness or self-alac would be nice too since chrono and mirage both have access to it too.
You could go Chaos to get protection on shatter but the duration is far too low to keep it up. You also cant keep up regeneration to keep up the 250 concentration and expertise trait.

The defense that comes with core is very low because mirage gains its defense by dodging.
So giving core good defense abilities means mirage would also get these, but mirages defense is so good already that it would make mirage far too op by giving core extra defense.
The problem this causes:
Virtuoso and Chrono both have to give defense via their e-spec traits, but they give none, thats why mirages defense is so good but chronos and virtuosos defense is slacking so hard. Well chrono has at least clones, but virtuoso doesnt even have that.

Extending some of the inspiration traits that activate on the F4 shatter to F5 would be a good start. This way Mirage doesn't benefit but Virtuoso and potentially Chronomancer does.

I also actively play a healing Virtuoso in most end-game pug content, normally without telling anyone. I guess they could connect the dots once I start feedback resurrecting. 

Edited December 29, 2023 by Mell.4873

[Zenith.7301]

Problem is most mesmer builds rely heavily on ether signet phantasm resets to sustain DPS, yet that healing signet has got a whopping 30 sec cd and most of the time you don't even benefit from the heal when you do need it due to the need to use it on cooldown rather than when you need the healing.

There was no reason to remove the block on F5 either.

[Mell.4873]

On 12/30/2023 at 5:30 PM, Zenith.7301 said:

Problem is most mesmer builds rely heavily on ether signet phantasm resets to sustain DPS, yet that healing signet has got a whopping 30 sec cd and most of the time you don't even benefit from the heal when you do need it due to the need to use it on cooldown rather than when you need the healing.

There was no reason to remove the block on F5 either.

Condition Virtuoso has alot of sustain so it doesn't need a heal. Chronomancer can just reset their phantasm after the continuum split combo if they need more healing. Honestly though the 30 second cooldown goes way down when you apply Alacrity. 

Edited March 23 by Mell.4873

[Ovark.2514]

They fixed one part of what what busted about Illusionary Inspiration. 3 More fixes to go before you can actually sustain yourself on power virt.