Virtuoso

“

"I imagine blades, you bleed."

The Virtuoso forgoes traditional illusions in favor of psychic daggers, wielded by the sheer power of the mind. Unleash a volley of sharp blades, then outwit your foes with a sharp mind.

— In-game description

Virtuoso is an elite specialization for the mesmer unlocked with the End of Dragons expansion. A virtuoso's greatest weapon is their mind. Instead of summoning clones like traditional mesmers, virtuosos create psychic daggers floating above their heads, replacing shatters with bladesongs that fire these daggers at their enemies.

They learn psionic skills to manifest blades to cut through any opposition, or distort themselves to evade attacks. Virtuosos can wield daggers in their main hand, light weapons to pierce foes with flying daggers and lacerate their minds.

List of virtuoso skills

See also: List of mesmer skills

Profession mechanic

“

Sharp blades, sharp mind.

— Virtuoso

As they do not summon clones, virtuosos replace shatter skills with Bladesongs.

#	Skill			Description
F1	Bladesong Harmony	0.75¾	12	Bladesong. Fire all stocked blades at your target.
F2	Bladesong Sorrow	0.5½	20	Bladesong. Fire all stocked blades, inflicting your target with conditions.
F3	Bladesong Dissonance	0.5½	30	Bladesong. Combine all your blades into one large blade that dazes targets based on the number of blades consumed.
F4	Bladesong Distortion		50	Bladesong. Gain distortion and consume all stocked blades, gaining additional distortion for each consumed blade.
F5	Bladeturn Requiem		30	Bladesong. Send your blades spinning around you to hit nearby foes. Spinning blade duration scales with number of blades consumed.

Weapon skills

#	Skill			Description
Dagger
1	Flying Cutter	0.5½		Send a blade of energy at your target. Hitting the same target multiple times invokes a flurry of blades on your target.
2	Bladecall		5	Throw a fan of daggers that return to you. If your target is in range, the returning daggers will lock on to that target. Stock a blade if this attack hits at least one target.
3	Unstable Bladestorm		12	Create a telekinetic storm of daggers that damages foes. With each interval, the bladestorm will fire blades at nearby enemies.
Sword
Replacing the clone skill   Illusionary Leap
3	Blade Leap	0.75¾	12	Leap to your target and stock a blade if you hit. Can be recast to return to your starting point.
3	Returning Edge			Shadowstep back to your previous location, crippling foes as you retreat.

Slot skills

Healing

Skill				Description
Twin Blade Restoration		1	20	Psionic. Heal yourself, lose conditions, and throw two blades at your target. If the first blade hits, you gain aegis. If the second blade hits, you gain vigor.

Utility

Skill				Description
Blade Renewal		2	35	Psionic. Channel to gain distortion and stock up to the maximum number of blades.
Rain of Swords		0.75¾	25	Psionic. Create a storm of blades that attacks a large area, damaging and applying vulnerability to targets.
Psychic Force		0.5½	20	Psionic. Knock back nearby foes with a psychic blade and gain boons.
Sword of Decimation		0.5½	25	Psionic. Drop a massive blade on a location, immobilizing enemies. This attack deals increased damage against controlled, downed, or defiant foes. Does bonus defiance-bar damage to defiant foes. Controls include stun, daze, knockback, pull, knockdown, sink, float, launch, taunt, and fear.

Elite

Skill				Description
Thousand Cuts			60	Psionic. Open a portal that devastates targets in a line in front of you with a flurry of blades.

List of virtuoso traits

See also: List of mesmer traits

Tier	Trait		Description
Minor Proficiency	Dagger Proficiency		You can wield daggers.
Minor Adept	Psychic Blades		Whenever a clone would be summoned, you instead stock a blade. Blades persist indefinitely until used. Your shatters are replaced with Bladesongs that consume your stocked blades, but still count as shatters for the purposes of core traits. While out of combat, you will automatically stock a blade every 10 seconds.
Major Adept	Bladeturn Refrain		Bladesongs grant aegis.
Major Adept	Mental Focus		Strike damage is increased against foes within the range threshold.
Major Adept	Jagged Mind		Blade attacks inflict bleeding on critical hits. A percentage of your condition damage dealt heals you.
Minor Master	Deadly Blades		Blades inflict vulnerability on critical hits. After successfully casting a Bladesong, increase all damage dealt for a short time. This does not stack.
Major Master	Duelist's Reversal	3	Blocking or dodging an attack grants boons.
Major Master	Phantasmal Blades		Phantasms that successfully complete their attack launch a blade at their target and grant you fury when they expire.
Major Master	Sharpening Sorrow		Gain fury when you activate Bladesong Sorrow. Fury increases your expertise.
Minor Grandmaster	Quiet Intensity		Fury gives an increased critical chance. Gain ferocity based on your vitality.
Major Grandmaster	Psychic Riposte	3	Blocking or evading an attack stocks blades. Dodging stocks a blade and causes your next Bladesong to be unblockable.
Major Grandmaster	Infinite Forge		Automatically stock blades while in combat. When you use bladesong above the blade threshold, refund blades. Blade attacks deal more damage.
Major Grandmaster	Bloodsong		Bleeding you apply deals increased damage. Stock a blade after applying enough stacks of bleeding to foes.

Lore

“

The virtuoso sharpens the power of their mind into deadly psionic blades. Unlike traditional mesmer illusions, they wield these directly as magic projectiles.

— Official site

“

The Mesmer is normally known for deviousness, trickery, and complexity, creating illusions to distract enemies and then ‘shattering’ them to various effect. Weaving telekinesis and the Canthan martial traditions of the blade into a wholly new style of fast and active combat, the virtuoso changes this by disregarding trickery and embracing all-out offense, using their magic to summon enchanted blades, which they wield telekinetically for immensely powerful attacks, or inflicting debilitating conditions.

— Elite specialization lore

“

Cantha is an ancient nation filled with culture, and what you get with that kind of age is tradition and heritage, and their combat and warfare is really no different, and the mesmer is kind of the embodiment of those themes. At the monasteries of Shing Jea they've learnt to channel all of their telekinetic powers into their main hand dagger (their new weapon), and instead of producing clones, they now use all of that energy to create blades to aid them in battle.

— Indigo Boock

Associated items

• Prima Donna
• Virtuoso's Dagger
• Piercing Aria

Related achievements

• Specializations: Adept Virtuoso — Begin training the mesmer's virtuoso elite specialization. (5)
• Specializations: Master Virtuoso — Completely train the mesmer's virtuoso elite specialization. (10)
• Specialization Collections: Prima Donna — Collect these 14 items and skins to receive the virtuoso's dagger, Prima Donna. (3)
• Specializations: Ministry-Approved Virtuoso — Purchase these 3 trinkets from the strike rewards vendor. (2)

Gallery

Concept art

• 

  Teaser "Mystery Dark"

• 

  Revealed concept art

• 

  Concept art with alternative gloves.

Promotional material

• 

  Still frame from the reveal video

• 

  Still frame from the reveal video

• 

  Promotional official icon

Icons

• 

  Official icon

• 

  Official icon

• 

  Wiki icon

Renders

• 

  Animated Virtuoso blade

Notes

• Instead of creating clones, a Virtuoso creates blades. Phantasms still will be summoned normally, but after using their skill, they also become blade charges. Up to 5 blade charges can be stored at a time.
• Traits and skills that trigger when creating an illusion (such as Compounding Power or Illusionary Defense) will trigger when creating a blade; however, traits that benefit illusions themselves (such as Sharper Images or Empowered Illusions) will not give any benefit to blades.
• Unlike clones or phantasms, blade charges stay even while out of combat.
• The Virtuoso mentor Daucus can be found at the Bloom of Seitung hero challenge within Seitung Harbor in Seitung Province.

Trivia

• In Guild Wars, mesmers had an armor insignia called Virtuoso's Insignia.
• In the game update of 4th of October 2022, the Bladesong Distortion skill was added to Virtuoso along with the restoration of Distortion to Chronomancer.
• A Virtuoso may occasionally shout one of these lines when using the following skills:

Upon stocking a blade

Another!

Sharper still.

Sharp blades, sharp mind

Upon using Bladesong Harmony, or Bladesong Sorrow, or Bladesong Dissonance

Dodge this!

Slice them apart!

You're finished!

Carve them up!

Blades away!

Upon using Bladeturn Requiem

Not happening!

Try me.

Untouchable.

When Unstable Bladestorm fires blades

Bladestorm!

Rain of Swords

Blade rain.

No escape.

Slash it all!

Upon using Blade Renewal

Blades, to me.

Return.

Upon using Sword of Decimation

Chop them in two!

Cut them down!

Strike!

Using Thousand Cuts

A thousand cuts!

Fill them full of holes!

Run them through!

External links

• Virtuoso spotlight on YouTube

References

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Mesmer