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- Viessa is a support character that focuses on ice attacks.
- Use abilities like Cold Snap and Ice Shards one after the other to trigger her Ice Shackle and Ice Sphere passives for more damage.
Viessa is one of three characters that greet you at the start of The First Descendant. Each of them supports distinct playstyles and once you pick one, you’ll have to stick with them through the early game. While you can unlock new Descendants with unique elemental powers later on, Viessa’s ice powers and solid damage make her a reliable support character. We’ve spent a good amount of time testing her skills against all sorts of threats and objectives. Read on to learn more about Viessa’s skills, how they factor into combat, and how you can design a solid build.
Our best Viessa build loadout
By latching enemies with her Ice Shackles and detonating Ice Spheres on them, Viessa can clear mobs fairly easily. You can pair this with Lepic’s Traction Grenade for maximum impact. And her moves can take on bosses as well. Even their invulnerability-granting orbs can be wiped out with her Blizzard move. But remember that Viessa is pretty fragile, with poor shield recovery and HP. So try not to run into every enemy with Frost Road. Here’s a summary of her key strengths and weaknesses:
- Strong crowd control ability thanks to Ice Shackle and Cold attacks
- Abilities flow into each other thanks to Ice Sphere passive
- Decent single-target damage for a starter
- Poor durability makes her a bad pick for boss fights
- Needs teamwork to pull off Ice Shackle debuffs
- More complex than other starters
As a support character that relies on getting close to deal more damage, here’s our best Viessa build:
- Modules: Storm Fist, Cold-Bloodedness, Skill Expansion, Chill Specialist, MP Collector, Increased HP
- Reactor: Frozen Mixture or Frozen Mechanics
- External components: Boost Max Shield, Max HP, and DEF
- Weapons: Thunder Cage, Nazeistra’s Devotion, Blue Beetle Scout Rifle, Secret Garden Tactical Rifle
- Weapon mods: Refrigerate Gunbarrel, Chill Priority, Bullet Rain, Quick Freezer, Snowflake Conductor
Best modules for Viessa
The Storm Fist sub module is an orange mod which, when levelled up by Silion in Albion, boosts your max module capacity. So spend your Kuiper Shards there to optimise your module strategy in The First Descendant. Here are the modules we recommend for a levelling build of Viessa:
- Cold-Bloodedness: When using a skill, increases Skill Power and decreases Skill Cost and Skill Cooldown. Frost Roads are not created when moving.
- Skill Expansion: Considerably increases your Skill Effect Range.
- Chill Specialist: Boosts the power of all your Chill Skills.
- MP Collector: You leech some MP from enemies.
- Increased HP: Boost Health.
Other modules like Emergency Measures (buff skill critical hit rate and damage) and Battle of Stamina (skill duration and HP) are better suited to Viessa but they can take a while to find when you’re levelling up. The Hypothermy mod even alters Ice Shackle into Ice Needle, dealing damage instead of slowing foes down. Nimble Fingers is another good choice as it lowers your skill cooldown durations. Consider trying out Ultimate Viessa as well with an Energy Activator to increase your mod capacity.
Best Reactor and external components for Viessa
When it comes to reactors, here are the items we recommend in-game for Viessa’s ice powers:
- Frozen Mixture: Grants a boost to Chill and Fusion types
- Frozen Mechanics: Grants a boost to Chill and Tech types
Remember to use the appropriate weapon mentioned in the reactor description to boost your Skill damage. As for the external components, here’s what you should focus on as Viessa:
- Max Shield: This bar will be restored after you take cover for some time.
- Max HP: You need health pickups to restore this so having more HP is better.
- DEF: Take less damage with these enhancements.
The Thunder Cage can clean up mobs easily. Image captured by VideoGamer.
Heal shields or weaken foes with this Hand Cannon. Image captured by VideoGamer.
The Blue Beetle relies on skill usage. Image captured by VideoGamer.
Use skills often to power the Secret Garden. Image captured by VideoGamer.
Best weapons and weapon modules for Viessa
We recommend close-range to mid-range weapons for Viessa. Since you’ll have to get close to enemies to debuff them with Frost Road, you can lean into this with SMGs, handguns, and shotguns. Assault rifles are a great pick too. Try having guns with multiple ammo types to ensure you don’t run out of ammo mid-fight. Scout Rifles and Tactical Rifles are good long-range options. Here are some ultimate weapons we recommend for Viessa:
- Thunder Cage Submachine Gun
- Nazeistra’s Devotion Hand Cannon
- Blue Beetle Scout Rifle
- Secret Garden Tactical Rifle
And here are the weapon mods that go well with Viessa’s kit:
- Refrigerate Gunbarrel: Chill ATK +23%, Fire Rate -6%
- Chill Priority: Chill ATK +13%, Reload Time Modifier -8%
- Bullet Rain: Fire Rate +8%, Firearm ATK +1%
- Quick Freezer: When defeating an enemy inflicted with Frostbite, inflicts Frostbite on other enemies nearby.
- Snowflake Conductor: When attacking enemies inflicted with Frostbite, Firearm ATK +X%.
Viessa skills and abilities explained
Viessa might focus on support skills but don’t underestimate her. Here’s what you need to know about Viessa’s ice skills:
- Ice Sphere: A passive skill that creates a floating spherical drone when you use a skill on an enemy affected by Ice Shackle. It flies towards the nearest enemy and explodes to deal a moderate amount of ice damage. Use the right modules to improve its damage.
- Frost Shards: Fire shards of ice that detonate on impact for burst damage to nearby enemies. This inflicts Ice Shackle on enemies. Modules can enhance shard blast radius and damage. Aim it at a pack of foes to maximise the Ice Shackle effect.
- Frost Road: As Viessa moves, she generates ice sheets that boost her movement speed and debuff enemies with Ice Shackle. Rely on modules to increase buff duration and ice sheet size. You can use this as a speed boost to escape or as a debuff against weaker foes.
- Cold Snap: A wave of ice that damages enemies in a line. Ice Shackle is inflicted on foes hit by this ability. Boost wave size and damage with modules in The First Descendant. Cycle between this arc of cold air and Frost Shards to deal massive damage.
- Blizzard: Toss a sphere that generates a blizzard that deals continuous ice damage to enemies. They are also hit with Ice Shackle. Once the blizzard ends, it explodes and deals more damage to nearby enemies. Modules will let you increase the duration, size, and damage of this ultimate move. It’s particularly great for adding stacks of Ice Shackle to foes.
And here’s a neat table that summarizes all the key values of Viessa’s abilities:
| Abilities | MP Cost | Cooldown (seconds) | Condition | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Frost Sphere | 0 | 20 | 1.5-meter radius | 260% of Power as Cold |
| Frost Shards | 22 | 7 | 3.5-meter radius | 770% Power as Cold |
| Frost Road | 24 | 25 (duration of 17) | +30% movement speed 1.6 m x 2 m ice sheet size | NA |
| Cold Snap | 30 | 20 | 10 m x 3 m area | 1104% of Power as Cold |
| Blizzard | 38 | 60 (duration of 6) | Blizzard radius: 4 m Detonation radius: 6 m | 1347% of Power as Cold, goes to 1746% on Detonation |
How to unlock Viessa
If you select Viessa during the tutorial, she is unlocked permanently at no additional cost. But if you didn’t, you’ll need to collect resources and unlock her at Magister Anais. This lengthy grind will involve Void Intercept Battle and Fusion Reactor events. She sits at a decent spot on our character tier list so she’s worth the effort.
Here’s what you need to unlock Viessa:
- Viessa Enhanced Cells
- Viessa Stabilizer
- Viessa Spiral Catalyst
- Viessa Code
Here’s how you can obtain these resources:
| Item | Source | Crafting cost | Research Time |
|---|---|---|---|
| Viessa Enhanced Cells | Intercept Battle: Grave Walker Intercept Battle (Hard): Dead Bride Intercept Battle (Hard): Swamp Walker White-Night Gulch: Void Fusion Reactor | 200K Gold 422 Repton 290 Semi-Permanent Plasma 40 Fusion Plasma Battery 1 Viessa Enhanced Cells Blueprint | 8 Hours |
| Viessa Stabilizer | Intercept Battle: Death Bride Intercept Battle (Hard): Frost Walker Vespers: Void Fusion Reactor White-Night Gulch: Abyssal Void Fusion Reactor | 200K Gold 239 Compound Coating Material 499 Monomolecular Extractor 14 Common Carbon Activator 1 Viessa Stabilizer Blueprint | 8 Hours |
| Viessa Spiral Catalyst | Intercept Battle: Swamp Walker Intercept Battle (Hard): Pyromaniac Intercept Battle (Hard): Frost Walker Sterile Land: Void Fusion Reactor | 200K Gold 571 Superfluid 386 Hardener 99 Synthesized Artificial Biometal 1 Viessa Spiral Catalyst Blueprint | 8 Hours |
| Viessa Code | Intercept Battle: Executioner (Amorphous Material Pattern 018) Intercept Battle: Devourer (Amorphous Material Pattern 030) Intercept Battle: Hard Swamp Walker (Amorphous Material Pattern 095) Echo Swamp Hard: Abyssal Void Fusion Reactor (Echo Swamp Derelict Covert) | 400K Gold 1 Viessa Enhanced Cells 1 Viessa Stabilizer 1 Viessa Spiral Catalyst 1 Viessa Code | 16 Hours |
How to play as Viessa
Here are some tricks to make the most of Viessa as a support character who deals decent damage:
- Use abilities one after the other in quick succession to activate Viessa’s Ice Shackle and Ice Sphere passives. This will let you dish out some serious damage to mobs and bosses.
- While the slow debuff might not mean much at first, it scales well into harder opponents and bosses. And with teammates, it will let you make enemies easy pickings for more offensive abilities.
- Use Frost Road to give enemies the Ice Shackle debuff right away as you start a fight. You can then chain this with Ice Shards or Cold Snap to lob Ice Spheres at them.
- Opt for the right modules to enhance Viessa’s abilities in combat. While extending range might not sound like a big deal, it will let you trap more enemies for allies to wipe out.
- Ice Shackle lowers enemy action speed, movement, and fire rate. You can have up to four stacks of them on an enemy, even a boss. So use this to your advantage while detonating Ice Spheres on foes.
About the Author
The First Descendant
- Platform(s): PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series S, Xbox Series X
- Genre(s): Action, Adventure, RPG
