Guild Wars 2

You’re not going to be a “candidate for the meta” unless you do better AOE damage than Staff Ele. Or have better team buffs than a warrior. Since those two things are basically impossible you should moderate your goals. As I’ve said multiple times, it’s reasonable to expect to be buffed to Ranger/Engie level but not reasonable to expect to be a meta profession.

well, i think you are taking it too far. Necros don’t need to have better team buffs than a warrior. Only one warrior is needed for team buffs.

As for AOE damage, it can only take you so far (the ridiculous thing about the elementalist, is that the aoe damage is also best against single targets).

To be part of the meta or, at least to NOT be an outcast, all we need is to provide more dps than a third ele would (you will have two eles in the parties until frost bow is nerfed). Since that seems very unlikely, we need to be able to increase oter people’s damage in a way only necros can, so we don’t overwrite anyone’s buffs or we are not despised because profession A, B, C and D do it better than us.

No, I’m not taking it too far. There are five players in a party. That means at most only 5 professions can be “meta” at any time.

So who are you looking to replace?

Ele? To do that you would have to find group-wide Fury somewhere and also have superior DPS than a staff ele with glyph of storms which is highly unlikely.

Guardian? Necro isn’’t going to take that role.

Thief? Role is too unique.

Warrior? To replace warrior you’d have to offer better team buffs (25 Might and banners and EA is pretty crazy to try to beat) which isn’t going to happen.

So I’m not seeing where you think Necro has a realistic chance of being meta. The absolute best you can hope for is that their DPS is good enough and rotation fun enough that people won’t feel too bad replacing the second ele with one. Which is exactly how people feel now about engie and ranger.

I dont play necro so i dont know how good they are at solo vs other classes condi and power wise. Lets assume that their solo is superior with hot release and that “raids” have split tactics that promote soloing, necros can be meta

Except they wont be good solo if encounters require more active defence than energy sigils and lifesteal sustain can provide. But yeah there is a possibility of things improving based on the stuff we know so far. I want to see atleast 1 reliable blast on a weapon in addition to what weve gotten so far though.

Gimme 1 evade/block and 1 blast and we’re talking. As forBone Minion, is there a benefit to them blasting at their location? if not could it be made to center the blast on us for potential of 2 additional blasts? Let the damage portion be around them, but the blast on us for the benefit of tactical use of the finisher.

The benefit to them blasting their location is that they self combo with death nova. So it would be a nerf to death nova builds. Also making them ground targeted is a similar nerf to minion builds due to delay. We actually discussed this on the necro forums. I came up with various solutions but most were pointed out to me as nerfs for minion builds for various reasons.

I feel like the best solution is to just reduce the summon cast time to reduce clunkyness. And increase the blast finisher effect radius so it can combo in small fields even if the minion isnt directly on top of the field. This doesnt solve the problem completely but it increases the reliability and best of all it doesnt nerf any minion related builds.

Also currently the blast effect doesnt occur until after the animation is complete. Which makes it feel very disconnected and clunky. Hopefully they will fix this as well.

well, dang.

The easiest fix for blast finishers would be to have Putrid Mark have a flip skill that enables you to blast the mark prematurely out of combat. Couple that with like one other blast finisher somewhere and they’re good to go.

Anyway, I don’t expect or really hope for Necros to ever be meta. There are basically three roles in speed clears.

• Best DPS: Elementalist (AOE) / Thief (Single Target) / Engi (Underwater)
• Best Group Skip Utility: Thief (Stealth) / Mesmer (Portal)
• Best Offensive Utility: Elementalist (Might + Fury) / Mesmer (Reflects) / Guard (Reflects + Heavy Support) / Warrior (Banners)

When you look at that, it’s no surprise that Ele/Ele/Thief/(Mesmer or Guard or Ele)/Warrior is your group comp of choice basically everywhere. If you wanted Necromancer to fit anywhere into that, you’d have to offer something better than what’s presented there. It’s like if the Necromancer got Warrior-level offensive support and somehow scored a smoke field for stealth, it could theoretically overtake Thief, but I somehow don’t see that happening.

That said. If we get 10 main instanced content you never know what might happen. :>

But that also depends on the content encouraging bruiser aoe classes that apply a lot of chill and debuff conditions.

One thing I thought about for 10 man instanced content would be the removal of the 5 man buff limit would be needed. Only needing one warrior to fully buff everyone in a 10 man group is a lot more freeing than requiring two, or two thieves needed for stealth etc.

I would hope that the party buff limit is removed so we can get a bit more diversity than 2w, 1g, 2t, 4x ele.

NikeEU.7690:

No, I’m not taking it too far. There are five players in a party. That means at most only 5 professions can be “meta” at any time.

So who are you looking to replace?

Ele? To do that you would have to find group-wide Fury somewhere and also have superior DPS than a staff ele with glyph of storms which is highly unlikely.

Guardian? Necro isn’’t going to take that role.

Thief? Role is too unique.

Warrior? To replace warrior you’d have to offer better team buffs (25 Might and banners and EA is pretty crazy to try to beat) which isn’t going to happen.

So I’m not seeing where you think Necro has a realistic chance of being meta. The absolute best you can hope for is that their DPS is good enough and rotation fun enough that people won’t feel too bad replacing the second ele with one. Which is exactly how people feel now about engie and ranger.

Sorry, i was talking about the meta all the time, but i don’t even intend the necro to become meta. Just something that doesn’t suck, and that can be close to meta in certain circumstances.

For example, if necros had the big buff to signet of vampirism i’m proposing, they could very well fill in for the second elementalist. People at least wouldn’t kick us out hoping for anything else.

Could also replace thieves when invisibility is not mandatory (and it actually never is, but comes really handy).

Alas, I don’t think necros could ever replace a ps warrior, or the main elementalist, and of course the guardian is untouchable for some content. But if we had better damage and a hughe party boost, we could be something close enough to meta that people wouldn’t mind having a necro in the party. And i don’t think a blast finisher and a fun rotation is going to cut it…. (other people don’t care what your rotation is, they just care what you can do for the run..)

Aye content design is far more likely to shake the meta than these specializations. Gimmicky content has the potential to encourage us to step outside of the standard meta. I can imagine a room in a dungeon where survival is all that matters, killing the enemies a waste with respawns and high HP. Control/survival skills would be a premium and in that Necro might see some love being able to chain fears and chills.

I know it worked wonders in my old games to shake up our standard raid makeups. Where we might only want 0-2 of a certain class typically suddenly on that raid we were happy to get 5+ (teams of 54, so yeah…)

It’s gimmicky though and not something I’d do everywhere or even have as a requirement but if you design the content correctly suddenly the goals become different and the tactics change.

I still think they should make an evade/block and blast skill for necros to use just to boost them into that “I can play them without feeling bad” zone like Engi/Ranger are at currently. I don’t think it’s unreasonable to add a 1s evade to Death’s Charge, sure 6s cooldown, but it’s in RS which has a cooldown of it’s own and can’t be maintained 100% so you’d still have to put some thought into how you do things. Adding “Shouts now Blast” to Augury of Death would be a good idea too.

Well even without the buff limit removal its going to give more variation in 10 man instances. You will need 2 warriors for the might and banners. Thats a given. But you will only need 1 thief. Blast effects prioritise party members. So aslong as each group of 5 has sufficient blasts then only 1 smoke field is needed. SR we can probably work without. And having 4/5 slots for ele is nice and all. But those are mostly dps slots so we actually have space for engis, rangers or necros for vuln and other stuff.

With buff limit changed to 10 and more challenging content i would expect to see meta comps of 1w, 1m, 1g, 1t, 4e, 1eng and 1n/r. Maybe 3 eles so you can fit all classes in.

A requirement for chill and epidemic is all it takes to get the necro into the meta for some content. And with so many party slots it cant hurt to have ranger + warrior for team buffing.

If would expect 10+ man instances to have heavy emphasis on splits besides maybe a large boss at the very end.

NikeEU.7690:

One thing I thought about for 10 man instanced content would be the removal of the 5 man buff limit would be needed. Only needing one warrior to fully buff everyone in a 10 man group is a lot more freeing than requiring two, or two thieves needed for stealth etc.

I would hope that the party buff limit is removed so we can get a bit more diversity than 2w, 1g, 2t, 4x ele.

Depending on the stealth skips, I’m pretty sure you could get away with one thief. You’d just need blasts from both parties in the smoke field.
- Though now I’m wondering why this isn’t done in WvW for a 14s stealth bombs. Besides the coordination usually failing miserably.

Artemis Thuras.8795:

NikeEU.7690:

One thing I thought about for 10 man instanced content would be the removal of the 5 man buff limit would be needed. Only needing one warrior to fully buff everyone in a 10 man group is a lot more freeing than requiring two, or two thieves needed for stealth etc.

I would hope that the party buff limit is removed so we can get a bit more diversity than 2w, 1g, 2t, 4x ele.

Depending on the stealth skips, I’m pretty sure you could get away with one thief. You’d just need blasts from both parties in the smoke field.
- Though now I’m wondering why this isn’t done in WvW for a 14s stealth bombs. Besides the coordination usually failing miserably.

Its because WvW players like to think their hotkitten and all. But in reality they are lazy and dont utilise half of what they could do to dominate their opponents.

Not sure if this has been covered but I think the only way necro can possibly make it into the dungeon meta is if they get decent mobility and even rediculous damage won’t be enough. Problem is bosses and trash last die extremely fast in record runs and most time is spent running from fight to fight. An ele or mesmer can help with this from fgs and portal respectively but those cooldowns are quite long, and adding more of those classes just takes away spots the necro could be taking while leaving the necro largely a leech on the party. Then again guardian is also slow but does quite well for it self so maybe not.

Mobility is purely a quality of life improvement. It wont help the necro at all in getting into groups. Especially since we have fgs and portal. And guardian is not slow in dungeons at all. Only mesmer and necro are slow because they have limited blinks and leaps.

There are much more important things which can improve the class. And they dont have to break the classes slow bruiser thematic like mobility does.

I think RS 2 and 4 should reflect projectiles. And GS4 should be a smoke field

Artemis Thuras.8795:

Depending on the stealth skips, I’m pretty sure you could get away with one thief. You’d just need blasts from both parties in the smoke field.
- Though now I’m wondering why this isn’t done in WvW for a 14s stealth bombs. Besides the coordination usually failing miserably.

It is you can see it in recent gvg’s they don’t bother with veil on mes because the cooldown is ridiculous compared to just having stealth whenever you please using the powder blasts.

spoj.9672:

Well even without the buff limit removal its going to give more variation in 10 man instances. You will need 2 warriors for the might and banners. Thats a given. But you will only need 1 thief. Blast effects prioritise party members. So aslong as each group of 5 has sufficient blasts then only 1 smoke field is needed. SR we can probably work without. And having 4/5 slots for ele is nice and all. But those are mostly dps slots so we actually have space for engis, rangers or necros for vuln and other stuff.

With buff limit changed to 10 and more challenging content i would expect to see meta comps of 1w, 1m, 1g, 1t, 4e, 1eng and 1n/r. Maybe 3 eles so you can fit all classes in.

A requirement for chill and epidemic is all it takes to get the necro into the meta for some content. And with so many party slots it cant hurt to have ranger + warrior for team buffing.

I can picture an encounter having 3 split rooms. One main path leads to an invuln enemy that has to remain agroed but the room has mechanics that are pure attrition, you just have to live through it, but pushes players doing so. This is your “what tank makes sense?” room. Though properly blasting water fields and good dodging/blocking can get you through, just be much easier with a more tanky setup and since you can’t kill it initially your dps means nothing for that time.

Left room is a Husk enemy promoting condi builds, your Engi’s and condi builds head there, dealing with a husk Champ and periodic adds, clear them you eliminate one of the attrition mechanics in the main room and open a pathway to join the center.

Right room is a Terragriff, chills/cripples/immob will prevent it’s basic leap attack, but not it’s additional howls that come through a breakbar stopping the attack and opening a burn phase. Charge isn’t susceptible to anything and simply has to be avoided (though I’d remove the trail effect). Killing it removes the second attrition mechanic in the main room and opens a path.

Once both bosses are down the invuln in the center room goes down and we join forces to blast that thing to smithereens.

Will they do this? /shrug doubt it, but point is they could potentially make content that requires splitting and certain professions will be better suited to different rooms. And, even different builds may make things substantially easier in different rooms. Condi, Defense, and Power damage are all encouraged, but not required.

May not be perfect but just off the top of my head how they could do a split event encouraging different aspects of the game and making us consider tweaking our “meta” And, I could see Necro taking a role in all 3 rooms, be it a condi build, the perma chill, or mitigating damage very well in the attrition room.

spoj.9672:

Well even without the buff limit removal its going to give more variation in 10 man instances. You will need 2 warriors for the might and banners. Thats a given. But you will only need 1 thief…
[…]
… With buff limit changed to 10 and more challenging content i would expect to see meta comps of 1w, 1m, 1g, 1t, 4e, 1eng and 1n/r. Maybe 3 eles so you can fit all classes in.
[…]

One crude suggestion: What would be the result if there was a hard limit of 1 profession per ‘raid’? (Total groupsize of 9, or perhaps with room for a double of one profession.)

Phadde.7362:

One crude suggestion: What would be the result if there was a hard limit of 1 profession per ‘raid’? (Total groupsize of 9, or perhaps with room for a double of one profession.)

It would become very hard to form groups.

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

Phadde.7362:

One crude suggestion: What would be the result if there was a hard limit of 1 profession per ‘raid’? (Total groupsize of 9, or perhaps with room for a double of one profession.)

It would become very hard to form groups.

What kind of raid is it if you can pug it easily?

Yeah well i dont think anyone wants that kind of restriction on a raid. Its just forced diversity.

NikeEU.7690:

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

Phadde.7362:

One crude suggestion: What would be the result if there was a hard limit of 1 profession per ‘raid’? (Total groupsize of 9, or perhaps with room for a double of one profession.)

It would become very hard to form groups.

What kind of raid is it if you can pug it easily?

An Anet raid.

Well if they do make tank rooms they either have to restrict armor swapping/trait swapping in raid instances otherwise it makes no sense as most will just put on tank for that part and then put on dps after. It will be annoying as hell.

Acotje.5689:

NikeEU.7690:

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

Phadde.7362:

One crude suggestion: What would be the result if there was a hard limit of 1 profession per ‘raid’? (Total groupsize of 9, or perhaps with room for a double of one profession.)

It would become very hard to form groups.

What kind of raid is it if you can pug it easily?

An Anet raid.

A gw2-Anet raid, to be exact. UW in gw1 wasn’t exactly pug friendly with ~80% of all runs failing.

I appreciate how constructive this thread is but Anet is never going to balance for the min/max crowd. Necro is perfectly relevant for the majority of players and unfortunately the “meta” and min/max is a minority.

Quells.2498:

I appreciate how constructive this thread is but Anet is never going to balance for the min/max crowd. Necro is perfectly relevant for the majority of players and unfortunately the “meta” and min/max is a minority.

The problem with that is, things trickle down. If the min/max community is all saying “dude necros are in a great spot now, everyone digs them” that will eventually trickle down to the rando-pug level about 6 months later. It helps to have the more influential players happy with a class.

I can agree with that. I really do enjoy the conversation I just think it’s probably a little too far fetched to expect Anet to prioritize making every class “meta” worthy.

Quells.2498:

I can agree with that. I really do enjoy the conversation I just think it’s probably a little too far fetched to expect Anet to prioritize making every class “meta” worthy.

meta worthy isnt exactly the objective they should try to reach, but they balance wise it tells you something about them. Also keep in mind they want to start evolving the game content to make more use of the actual game mechanics. Most of the things people are talking about are things classes bring to pve gameplay in groups.

In group content being able to provide a lot of blasts will always be valuable
being able to give people might also valuable
being able to protect groups is valuable
being able to help transport them is valuable
which fields your class has access to,
how much control you can do
type of DPS you can do
etc.
right now, most of the game mechanics do not meld well with necros. Once they design content that is more accessible, where what players can do for a group is valuable, people will be looking at classes in terms of what they can bring to the table.

EcoRI.9273:

Well if they do make tank rooms they either have to restrict armor swapping/trait swapping in raid instances otherwise it makes no sense as most will just put on tank for that part and then put on dps after. It will be annoying as hell.

Well, I imagined that’d be the majority of the raid. I don’t see GW2 ever going to the substantially long raid thing. I figured they could have a set of hallways or a single hallway that you had to clear areas to turn off or disrupt something (think cliffside type seals, or some such thing), then you get to the area I spoke about before. And burning 2 bosses in 30s and moving to the main room isn’t really going to make playing defense hard, I’d imagine even a very dps focused team would be taking 5 mins to down the side bosses, yes this means abnormally long runs for less dps focused teams, but such are the choices you make. Could potentially add other mechanics if the length got out of control for less damage focused groups, but not such that they even compare to more damaged focused groups.

Either way, it was just a make beleive scenario to show how content could promote different areas. Even clearing up with the scenario I just said having 2 tanky guys carrying the triggers to the “seals” wouldn’t be much of a loss that swapping might not even matter and having them a bit beefier could be very nice with a very good tradeoff between those two points.

phys.7689:

right now, most of the game mechanics do not meld well with necros. Once they design content that is more accessible, where what players can do for a group is valuable, people will be looking at classes in terms of what they can bring to the table.

Oh, it’s the reverse, actually.
Right now, necros don’t meld well with most of the game mechanics.

Blast finishers? only if you bring useless minions or not on demand (staff 4)
Combo fields? We have the most useless ones, and they tend to overwrite the useful ones limiting your damage output if you want to place them at the right time.
Offensive utility? Necros have zero.
Defensive utility? Protection only by sacrificing dps and negating the group’s ability to gain might via fire fields (might not be so bad if a PS warrior provides might).
Any other type of support? Blinds, might come handy for hard trash packs.
CCs: yes. But the problem is, CC is not effective against bosses. and, when it is, then elementalists provide the only cc the group needs.

Rather than saying that the whole game and all other professions don’t meld with necros, it’s quite obvious that the people designing necros went for something totally different. Something for another game. The result is a worthless profession for group content.

Why do people always mention protection for necro. The only access to protection the necro has is spectral wall (will troll in PvE because of the fear). And Ritual of Protection. Which is totally useless and can barely be considered access to protection. I dont really see how 3 second protection on well use (which have long cooldowns) is any sort of viable form of protection. You spam 4 wells and get 12 seconds of protection. So good! /s

That trait should have always been wells pulse protection at the very least. But noone really cared because its such a bad trait in a bad line.

Aenesthesia.1697:

phys.7689:

right now, most of the game mechanics do not meld well with necros. Once they design content that is more accessible, where what players can do for a group is valuable, people will be looking at classes in terms of what they can bring to the table.

Oh, it’s the reverse, actually.
Right now, necros don’t meld well with most of the game mechanics.

Blast finishers? only if you bring useless minions or not on demand (staff 4)
Combo fields? We have the most useless ones, and they tend to overwrite the useful ones limiting your damage output if you want to place them at the right time.
Offensive utility? Necros have zero.
Defensive utility? Protection only by sacrificing dps and negating the group’s ability to gain might via fire fields (might not be so bad if a PS warrior provides might).
Any other type of support? Blinds, might come handy for hard trash packs.
CCs: yes. But the problem is, CC is not effective against bosses. and, when it is, then elementalists provide the only cc the group needs.

Rather than saying that the whole game and all other professions don’t meld with necros, it’s quite obvious that the people designing necros went for something totally different. Something for another game. The result is a worthless profession for group content.

not disagreeing with everything you say here, but the key here is what necro isnt great for the current meta, which may change if they change monster behaviors, encounter design, CC effectiveness, Condition stacking.

point is they COULD thematically provide useful things, but not for the current meta.

For me the biggest problem with necro design(even if the meta changes and their stuff is more valuable), is it doesnt feel like its currently a great execution of most of the things they were going for.

I think reaper will be tighter design wise, but the core still feels a bit off.

spoj.9672:

Why do people always mention protection for necro. The only access to protection the necro has is spectral wall (will troll in PvE because of the fear). And Ritual of Protection. Which is totally useless and can barely be considered access to protection. I dont really see how 3 second protection on well use (which have long cooldowns) is any sort of viable form of protection. You spam 4 wells and get 12 seconds of protection. So good! /s

That trait should have always been wells pulse protection at the very least. But noone really cared because its such a bad trait in a bad line.

if you were placing spectral wall mostly for 9-12 seconds of renewable protection, you could place it where the enemy doesnt go, like right behind your team/self. My main beef with it, is the long cool down, and my general desire for less mitigation based gameplay.

There are plenty of thematically correct things they could add to make the necro fit the current meta (accessible blasts, unique debuffs, high damage, gw1 style skills and group lifesteal which we are getting). It really is the reverse. Which do think is the real problem? A single class out of 8 that doesnt fit. Or a meta which fits all classes except one. Im going to say the necro is the problem.

The meta isnt perfect. But group interaction is always going to be the most valuable part of it. This is an MMO. Group play is the purpose of this type of game. We need to be valuable in a group. Something as simple as a single accessible blast finisher and a bit more damage can improve our standing dramatically in casual group situations.

spoj.9672:

There are plenty of thematically correct things they could add to make the necro fit the current meta (accessible blasts, unique debuffs, high damage, gw1 style skills and group lifesteal which we are getting). It really is the reverse. Which do think is the real problem? A single class out of 8 that doesnt fit. Or a meta which fits all classes except one. Im going to say the necro is the problem.

The meta isnt perfect. But group interaction is always going to be the most valuable part of it. This is an MMO. Group play is the purpose of this type of game. We need to be valuable in a group. Something as simple as a single accessible blast finisher and a bit more damage can improve our standing dramatically in casual group situations.

i think the meta is a bigger fail.

• Blast finisher is too useful compared to all other finisher types
• field effectiveness is not balanced for the different fields
• Combat systems whereby the most effective control is standing all together in one spot
• enemies that are all too similar in attack speed, who dont have multiple skills to use.
• too much value on avoidance of enemies – im not against making skip mechanics, but they should balance the speed gained from skipping with some benefits or reasons to fight certain things.

i would say that the meta or rather the flaws in the combat design/encounter design are some of the main culprits.

Even if you fix those (and you cant fix them all). The problem will still be there. Because group interaction is important. Like i said the content isnt perfect. But as it stands its the necro that is the problem.

Finishers are ok to a certain degree. The problem with leaps is they often move you away from the group/field so even if the effects are good they arent perfect. You cant really change this because they wouldnt make sense if they were changed. Whirls have problems with reliability which could be fixed with enemy/ally tracking. Projectiles are fine. Blasts are fine. Its just blasts work better for buffing because you dont move. And projectiles have a more niche use.

Field balance is actually not too bad. Its just certain fields are only situational. With break bar changes dark fields should be much better. And with condition cap changing. Ethereal fields with projectile + whirl finishers could become a thing.

Not going to even respond to your third point. Its not worth getting into an arguement over.

Limited mob complexity is an issue. But even with more complex AI it wont really change anything. Groups will just use CC and blind spam to control the group. Just as they do already. It will simply become even more important.

I dont agree with the last point. There are benefits. And thats reliability. Mob loot and slightly more difficult mobs could shift this either way. More difficult trash might encourage people to skip more. People are always going to value time. There are ways to solve this to a certain degree but i dont think its in anyway a serious problem.

spoj.9672:

Even if you fix those (and you cant fix them all). The problem will still be there. Because group interaction is important. Like i said the content isnt perfect. But as it stands its the necro that is the problem.

Finishers are ok to a certain degree. The problem with leaps is they often move you away from the group/field so even if the effects are good they arent perfect. You cant really change this because they wouldnt make sense if they were changed. Whirls have problems with reliability which could be fixed with enemy/ally tracking. Projectiles are fine. Blasts are fine. Its just blasts work better for buffing because you dont move. And projectiles have a more niche use.

Field balance is actually not too bad. Its just certain fields are only situational. With break bar changes dark fields should be much better. And with condition cap changing. Ethereal fields with projectile + whirl finishers could become a thing.

Not going to even respond to your third point. Its not worth getting into an arguement over.

Limited mob complexity is an issue. But even with more complex AI it wont really change anything. Groups will just use CC and blind spam to control the group. Just as they do already. It will simply become even more important.

I dont agree with the last point. There are benefits. And thats reliability. Mob loot and slightly more difficult mobs could shift this either way. More difficult trash might encourage people to skip more. People are always going to value time. There are ways to solve this to a certain degree but i dont think its in anyway a serious problem.

finishers:
leap finisher is almost always an inferior form of the blast finisher, you use leap because you get it for free/cheap.
the only time its actually something different(not an aura that does what the blast does but only if you get hit) is dazing strike, and lightning fields are fairly rare.

projectile finishers, could be useful, except they are designed where most projectile finishers are 20% chance, making them unreliable, and not really that great. the skills that are 100% finishers are usually on cooldowns too long to make good use of the meager effects of the finisher, which is generally balanced as if a lot of people were proccing at higher than 20% rate

Whirl finishers, would probably be better, but often hit nothing.

fields: based on the encounter design, most defensive fields are less useful, auras are generally really bad, for the same reason most people dont like necro support (mitigation is not a strong use)

3rd point: im not saying standing all in one spot shouldnt be a technique for controlling enemies, im saying it shouldnt be the only reliable way to control enemies, and also some enemies should basically make this type of play less advantageous. like in pvp, some enemies are strong at AOE group CC, or can negate predictable attacks (like prefering to stay 600 range whilst using Projectile blocking skills, or just moving around in the fight sometimes.
.
the fact that groups will be able to deal with enemies via CC and defensive skills, is fine. People should have to use CC and defensive skills to control opponents, different opponents to different degrees.

im not saying the game should make mechanics people cant win against, im saying the game should make mechanics where there are real choices/reasons/benefits for using more of the skills in general play. Yes it happens, sometimes, but not enough.

spoj.9672:

I dont agree with the last point. There are benefits. And thats reliability. Mob loot and slightly more difficult mobs could shift this either way. More difficult trash might encourage people to skip more. People are always going to value time. There are ways to solve this to a certain degree but i dont think its in anyway a serious problem.

mob loot is too crappy and killing more difficult enemies in instanced content is generally the worst way to get massive monster loot.
I am not saying skipping shouldnt be a thing, im saying it should only be one thing. They should have play types, with their own benefits that create a different type of way of playing at a high level, which will also increase the viablity of other playstyles, when its not primarily about fighting one big enemy.

possibilities: some instance specific random good drops;
special events (that are worthwhile to complete) that involve fighting groups well.
bonuses on completion for killing enemies (non respawning, or enemies designed to be avoided)
hidden events/bosses (that have value to beat) that trigger when you reach hard to skip areas.

many would still speed clear, and they should, but there should also be benefits, beyond monster drops, which are easier to get, and more plentiful in the open world.

Blasts are far more valuable than other finishers. The others have their uses, but I’ve never swapped a utility/weapon/etc so I could have access to a whirl/leap/projectile finisher, nor have I ever really felt like things would go better had I slotted one. Meanwhile, there are countless times that I’ve brought a skill or weapon just to have a blast — and if I don’t have any, I feel like I’m not pulling my weight on stealth/might stacking/etc. I don’t play my ele much anymore, but the last time I checked the metabuild, most of the utilities and heals were chosen specifically for blasts. I haven’t seen any other finisher come close to that level of usefulness.

That said, it’s not something that I think they can really fix, or at least, I don’t have any suggestions to improve them. I think that the blast finishers’ popularity is due to their ease-of-use — you don’t get moved away from the group (leap), you don’t have to aim or worry about positioning (proj), and you don’t have to depend on RNG to land the combo effect (whirl). That simplicity of just “stand in the field and have it 100% work” is hard to compete with.

Fields are in an “ok” spot in my book. Not terrible, but not well balanced….but acceptable. Some are far, far more useful than others, but there is at least some reason to use a variety of them. Still, Fire >> Smoke/Lightning > everything else. Weakness from poison fields can be situationally handy if you’re running with a lot of new players, condition removal from shooting through a lightfield has haved my kitten in a few situations, but the benefits just aren’t as useful as might, stealth, and situationally, swiftness.

@phys
You kind of just outlined what i already said.

With the skipping thing there are alternatives already. What you are suggesting are simply extra choices in instances. So events and such in a huge elite zone (we dont have this type of content yet so it doesnt fit). But people value time and reward over most things. Time is a valuable resource. You cant really fix this unless you overbuff loot which will create farms that need to be nerfed into oblivion. Which means you are back to square one.

And i dont think its a bad thing that blasts are the best type of finisher. I do think 20% chance projectile finishers should be changed to 100%. And i do think whirls should be made more reliable. But other than that its fine. Theres always going to be a best way to do certain things.

As far as fields are concerned. Fire, smoke and lightning are on equal footing. Group swiftness and stealth is invaluable out of combat buffs. Might is invaluable in combat. They are different and opposite situations but that doesnt mean either is better than the other. In fact lightning field could be considered the best simply because swiftness is always useful. As far as other fields go water is niche but very useful. Light would be really good if whirls were more reliable to trigger the cleanse. Dark fields will be good with the break bar stuff. Ethereal will maybe be good with condi changes. Poison is niche for weakness and probably the only field that will stay bad.

I liked an option I’ve seen in old games. Attack the boss without taking out it’s minions and they all rush you.

Skip the Ascalon trash, well guess what comes at you once you reach the center room and start taking out the Siege.

I liked this option because it made a bit of a dynamic situation, you could kill everything while taking it slow. Or you could rush through and try to take everything out when it’s summoned/running to you. Or a combination of the two maybe taking out the more dangerous enemies on your way through then using the summon mechanic to pull the trash together for you to blast down quickly.

Good content design solves so many problems, I wish ANet would get a bit more creative with it. I’m sure they have the brains to get it done, it’s just a matter of time, something they don’t seem willing to put forth on such an endeavor.

spoj.9672:

@phys
You kind of just outlined what i already said.

With the skipping thing there are alternatives already. What you are suggesting are simply extra choices in instances. So events and such in a huge elite zone (we dont have this type of content yet so it doesnt fit). But people value time and reward over most things. Time is a valuable resource. You cant really fix this unless you overbuff loot which will create farms that need to be nerfed into oblivion. Which means you are back to square one.

And i dont think its a bad thing that blasts are the best type of finisher. I do think 20% chance projectile finishers should be changed to 100%. And i do think whirls should be made more reliable. But other than that its fine. Theres always going to be a best way to do certain things.

As far as fields are concerned. Fire, smoke and lightning are on equal footing. Group swiftness and stealth is invaluable out of combat buffs. Might is invaluable in combat. They are different and opposite situations but that doesnt mean either is better than the other. In fact lightning field could be considered the best simply because swiftness is always useful. As far as other fields go water is niche but very useful. Light would be really good if whirls were more reliable to trigger the cleanse. Dark fields will be good with the break bar stuff. Ethereal will maybe be good with condi changes. Poison is niche for weakness and probably the only field that will stay bad.

ethereal will still be inferior with condi changes.

fire totally destroys it:

• aoe might: obvious benefits.
• fire aura: might stacks and burning when you get hit (increase of dps on getting hit)
• fire bolts: 328+.25xcondi dmg per bolt. now will stack.

ethereal field

• chaos aura: good boon is protection, other two not very useful with pve design. generally people would rather have might. confusion, less dmg than fire and may not even get a good proc, and blind is the good negative effect.
• confusion bolt 130+.2condi dmg per proc, lasts 5 seconds, which is currently generally one attack. Even if they change it to have a over time element and a on proc element, unless the overtime dps is noticeable, it will still be inferior to 1 second of burn.

ethereal is basically inferior to fire field. this only changes if it has a signifigant amount of DPS on the passive portion, OR monster attack more often.

which i would welcome, for some enemies.

Erm. You know they said that burn is getting nerfed because it will stack. I said maybe ethereal will be good. We do know confusion is getting two damage components. So that most likely means a tick and a bonus on skill use. So it could very well beat burning. And it also depends on the enemy. We might get more frequent attacking bosses in the future.

Also fire does not complete destroy it. Phalanx warrior makes fire fields mostly redundant mid fight. And its not like you cant use both fields in sequence to get burn and confusion. If there is a worthwhile use then the fields become good regardless how often others are used.

spoj.9672:

Erm. You know they said that burn is getting nerfed because it will stack. I said maybe ethereal will be good. We do know confusion is getting two damage components. So that most likely means a tick and a bonus on skill use. So it could very well beat burning. And it also depends on the enemy. We might get more frequent attacking bosses in the future.

Also fire does not complete destroy it. Phalanx warrior makes fire fields mostly redundant mid fight. And its not like you cant use both fields in sequence to get burn and confusion. If there is a worthwhile use then the fields become good regardless how often others are used.

i think they will nerf mostly its durations, burning that isnt high dps, high base is kind of pointless, might as well be bleed.

also since its one field ar a time, and a limited amount of finishers, they are kind of competing with each other, and even if they werent directly, in terms of class balance, the guys with the better fields would need to have some balance against the guys with the niche fields.

anyhow some of the things they are suggesting may change may help things, or at least ease them.