The Infernal Twinblades and Mortal Rope Dart pairing in Where Winds Meet is built around a simple idea: let Rope Dart set up devastating on‑hit effects, then let Twinblades’ absurd attack speed cash them in. Played correctly, you sit in melee as a lifestealing blender while spectral rats chew through everything in the background.
Core concept of the Twinblades + Rope Dart build
Both Infernal Twinblades and Mortal Rope Dart follow the Bamboocut – Wind path, which keeps attribute and elemental scaling consistent. The synergy comes from three pillars:
- Rodent Rampage uptime: Mortal Rope Dart’s Rodent Rampage summons a rat that attacks whenever you land Light Attacks. Infernal Twinblades’ high attack speed lets you trigger that effect many times.
- Flamelash burst windows: Infernal Twinblades build a Flamelash (fury) meter through Light Attacks and skills such as Addled Mind. When Flamelash is active, you gain lifesteal, higher crit chance, and higher crit damage, so every hit—and every rat bite—gets much more dangerous.
- Armor and defense shredding: Internal Arts like Echoes of Oblivion, Breaking Point, and Morale Chant add physical penetration, critical damage, and stacking damage buffs that scale directly with hit count.
The result is a build with:
- Very high sustained DPS if you keep attacking.
- Strong self‑healing during Flamelash from Twinblades’ lifesteal.
- Enough mobility and crowd control to stay on target in raids and open world PvE.
Martial Arts: how the weapons work together
| Weapon | Path | Primary role |
|---|---|---|
| Mortal Rope Dart | Bamboocut – Wind | Summons rats, applies Vendetta debuff, provides pulls and charge stance buff. |
| Infernal Twinblades | Bamboocut – Wind | Main DPS, Flamelash lifesteal mode, fast Light Attacks for on‑hit effects. |
In combat, the Rope Dart acts as the setup weapon:
- Charged Heavy Attack: Charging Rope Dart’s heavy attack briefly grants a special skill enhancement that significantly boosts your next Rodent Rampage summon and adds Qi damage.
- Bladebound Thread: This pull skill drags enemies in and, on the follow‑up hit, applies Vendetta, a debuff that makes your Might Rat deal around 50% more damage for a short period and extends Bladebound Thread duration when supported by the Vendetta Inner Way.
- Rodent Rampage: Summons the Might Rat, which continues attacking even after you swap to Infernal Twinblades.
Infernal Twinblades then take over:
- Light Attack strings are extremely fast and are the main source of damage and fury generation.
- Once the Flamelash bar is full, activating it ramps up attack speed, lifesteal, crit chance, and crit damage.
- During Flamelash, you largely spam Light Attacks for raw DPS; Mystic Skills are used in specific windows rather than on cooldown.
Recommended Internal Arts for Twinblades + Rope Dart
The Bamboocut – Wind Internal Arts line contains most of what this build needs. A common layout is:
| Internal Art | Effect summary | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| Echoes of Oblivion | Infernal Twinblades’ normal Light Attacks apply Sin; Light Attacks under Flamelash apply Karma. Hitting targets with both Sin and Karma ignores a chunk of Physical Defense and Bamboocut resistance. | Core DPS increase, especially against bosses with high armor. |
| Morale Chant | High chance on attack or healing to gain a stack of Yi River, each stack increasing Physical Damage and healing for several seconds, stacking up to 5 times. | Universal damage steroid that scales with hit count from Twinblades and rats. |
| Breaking Point | Critical hits on Exhausted enemies apply stacks of Disintegration, each giving Physical Penetration and Critical Damage Bonus. | Big boost to execute‑phase damage when targets are low on Qi and Exhausted. |
| Vendetta | Extends Vendetta Token duration and restores Token of Gratitudes; empowers Guided Blade’s Vendetta effects. | Directly buffs rat damage during Bladebound Thread, improving overall summon DPS. |
Some players temporarily swap Vendetta for more obtainable options, such as Fivefold Bleed or Bitter Seasons, until they can fully level Vendetta. These alternatives add bleed or poison stacks and extra physical defense reduction, but the long‑term goal is still Echoes of Oblivion, Morale Chant, Breaking Point, and Vendetta for this pairing.
Mystic Skills for the build
Mystic Skills give you crowd control, single‑target punishes, and large burst phases layered on top of your weapons. A focused setup for PvE Twinblades + Rope Dart uses a mix of control and multi‑hit damage:
| Mystic Skill | Main use |
|---|---|
| Ghost Bind | Flashes forward, immobilizing up to six targets and breaking Vital Points on weaker enemies. Ideal opener to lock mobs in place. |
| Wolflike Frenzy | Knocks down a target, then unleashes rapid strikes and a disabling finisher. Strong single‑target damage and control, particularly versus Unstable Poise enemies. |
| Talon Strike | High‑hit follow‑up that works well after control setups; also a good finisher in single‑target rotations. |
| Soaring Spin | Multi‑hit spin with excellent damage, useful both as burst and gap closer when cancelled or chained correctly. |
| Dragon's Breath | Applies a fire debuff and deals repeated hits; sets up an empowered combo with Drunken Poet if you have the relevant synergy. |
| Drunken Poet | Rapid multi‑hit skill that becomes even stronger when used on fire‑debuffed targets; fits cleanly into windows after Ghost Bind or Bladebound Thread pulls. |
| Flaming Meteor | High AOE damage over three hits in a tight area; best when enemies are tightly stacked by Bladebound Thread or Ghost Bind. |
| Free Morph | Flexible offensive Mystic that helps smooth out gaps in your single‑target rotation. |
For pure PvE bossing, many players lean on a core of Ghost Bind, Wolflike Frenzy, Talon Strike, and a multi‑hit nuke such as Soaring Spin or the Dragon’s Breath → Drunken Poet sequence. Flaming Meteor is strong for dungeons when packs are consistently grouped and safe to stand in.
Gear sets and stat priorities
Different groups recommend slightly different armor sets, but the logic is consistent: give Twinblades the stats they need for sustained Light Attack damage while making sure you don’t instantly die the moment Flamelash drops.
Weapon and armor sets
| Slot | Recommended set | Key effects | Reason |
|---|---|---|---|
| Weapons | Swallowcall | 2‑piece: Bonus to minimum Physical Attack. 4‑piece: Light Attacks deal more damage to targets below 40% Qi and extra damage to Exhausted enemies. |
Pairs perfectly with high hit count and Breaking Point’s execute focus; smooths damage range and buffs your main spam attack. |
| Armor | Flawless Defense | 2‑piece: Flat Physical Defense bonus. 4‑piece: Baseline damage reduction, plus extra reduction as HP falls below 60%, scaling every 10% HP lost. |
Gives sorely needed mitigation for a melee DPS that cannot always avoid hits in busy raid mechanics. |
Alternative early‑game combination
Some players also run a combination like Hawkwing weapons with Eaglerise armor (as seen in planner builds) when Swallowcall or Flawless Defense are not yet available. The exact stat lines on those sets are still being refined, but the pattern is the same: offensive weapon set, defensive armor set.
Stat tuning priorities
On individual pieces, tuning matters as much as the set bonuses. Priorities for Twinblades + Rope Dart are:
- Crit Rate: Top priority, because Flamelash already adds crit and crit damage. More crit rate means more uptime on big orange affinity crits.
- Affinity: High value because of the enormous hit count from Light Attacks and rats. Affinity can be the highest damage scaler once you already have solid crit.
- Max Physical Attack / Min Physical Attack: Directly raises all physical hits and interacts well with Swallowcall’s minimum attack bonus.
- Precision Rate (accuracy): Prevents gray “miss” numbers, which otherwise waste procs and lower DPS.
- Power and Agility main attributes: Power for raw attack, Agility for additional crit rate.
Element‑specific stats like “Bamboocut Attack” help, but they generally do not affect Mystic Skills, so broad physical and crit stats are usually more efficient for this build.
Main PvE rotation for Infernal Twinblades + Mortal Rope Dart
The rotation is built around four recurring steps: buff the rat, apply Vendetta, summon the rat, then swap and spend Flamelash on Twinblades. A practical loop looks like this:
- Start on Mortal Rope Dart.
- Charge Rope Dart’s Heavy Attack for about one to one and a half seconds to gain the Special Skill Enhancement that buffs your next rat summon and grants healing.
- Use Bladebound Thread to pull enemies together and perform its follow‑up to apply Vendetta. This sets up a damage bonus for the Might Rat and extends the thread duration when using the Vendetta Inner Way.
- Cast Rodent Rampage to summon the empowered Might Rat while Vendetta is active.
- Swap to Infernal Twinblades using the Dual‑Weapon Skill or weapon swap. The rats continue attacking during and after the swap.
- On Twinblades, build your Flamelash meter using Light Attacks and skills such as Addled Mind and Calamity’s Greed.
- Use Calamity’s Greed as a two‑part skill: cast the spinning blade, then press it again when it returns and flashes to trigger two strong slashes and enter the Enlightened state, which reduces your main martial skill (Q) cooldown by several seconds.
- Once Flamelash is full, activate Flamelash and spend the entire window on Light Attack strings, weaving in a triple dash combo and only very high‑value Mystic Skills such as Soaring Spin or Dragon’s Breath → Drunken Poet when they do not break your attack rhythm.
- As Flamelash ends or your rats’ timer expires, swap back to Rope Dart and repeat: Bladebound Thread → Rodent Rampage → swap.
Another way to visualize the core loop is:
Rope Dart: Charged Heavy → Bladebound Thread → Rodent Rampage
→ Swap to Twinblades: Build Flamelash → Calamity's Greed combo → Flamelash Light Attack spam
→ Swap back to Rope Dart when rats expire or Flamelash is down → repeat.For multi‑target pulls, insert Ghost Bind at the very start to freeze enemies, then immediately follow with Bladebound Thread so your pull plus rat summon and Mystic Skills all land on the same cluster.
Gameplay tips and common pitfalls
- Do not overuse charged heavies mid‑combo: Rope Dart’s charged heavy buff is powerful as an opener, but repeatedly charging it mid‑fight often slows your rotation enough to lose overall DPS. Most high‑level players only charge at the start of a loop or when mechanics force downtime.
- Avoid face‑tanking during Flamelash: Lifesteal is generous, but not infinite. Treat Flamelash as a window to stay aggressively in melee, not as a license to ignore area attacks or boss mechanics.
- Keep attacking to maintain Morale Chant stacks: Yi River stacks fall off if you stop hitting something. Delay unnecessary movement and animation‑heavy skills if they interrupt constant Light Attacks.
- Use Calamity’s Greed timing: Press the skill a second time only when the returning blade visibly glows, and you hear the cue. Prematurely recasting wastes the Enlightened state and its cooldown reduction on your core martial skill.
- Use Rope Dart as a utility, not a second DPS phase: In this build, Infernal Twinblades are your primary damage dealer. Rope Dart’s job is to summon rats, apply Vendetta, and group enemies; staying on Rope Dart for extended Light Attack chains typically lowers your output.
Infernal Twinblades with Mortal Rope Dart demand fast inputs and tight awareness, but they pay you back with some of the most satisfying sustained DPS in Where Winds Meet. Once the rotation feels natural and your Internal Arts and gear sets are in place, you can take this setup into anything from solo exploration to high‑end raids and watch Twinblades ride a wave of spectral rats and crits through every encounter.
