Guild Wars 2

With all the talks about the MoB nerf’s I think a lot of people are missing the even bigger and more important nerf of the patch preview. Damage pressure has never been an issue with necros. What we lacked has always been defence and the Curses IV trait was one Necro’s only form of defence and it’s getting a 60% nerf.

For those not familiar with this trait Weakening Shroud. It cast the Dagger 5 skill around you on DS activation giving weakness to those around you. Because Necro’s have no vigor, the weakness from this trait was our only defence against CC/burst combos like thief stun /back stab, warrior shield stun/skull crack, and mesmer immobilize shatter burst.

Anet have stated multiple times that they wise Death Shroud to be Necro’s defence and sustain. With this 60% nerf to the internal CD, Death Shroud can not longer be a reliable defence against thieves’ and warriors’ bursts. Your meagre life-force will be immediately chewed up and your health will melt before your eyes.

When our class does not have vigor, this is pretty much the only sustainable defence against Bursts.

The only important part of this nerf is the nerf to weakness. And even then, I think its really only a big deal in PvE. I just don’t think it was used often enough on CD in PvP for this to be as big of a nerf as it seems.

Don’t get me wrong, its still a nerf, but I am not surprised by it.

Given the state of condition classes in PvE, it isn’t even part of the discussion as the patch was geared toward balancing around PvP.

I only play condi necro for PvP and WvW and I use this trait on CD. It is a vital part of a necro’s rotation against most classes. The weakness uptime is absolutely crucial against certain classes as mentioned above when we have no vigor.

If you fought enough other class meta builds and spent enough time roaming in WvW, then you’d appreciate how important this trait is and how much a 10 second CD increase hurts the defence capabilities on necromancers.

Yes, this is the one that really hurt reading. I rely on that trait to survive against thieves/warriors. It will still be a good trait, and I will still use it the same way… But was it really in need of a nerf? If they thought it provided too much AE bleeding, then nerf that.. not my weakness.

In a PvE Power build. It was one of the things I used to try to get from the condi line.
With PVT gear, it was nice to be able to see the dungeon group get in trouble, run in gen threat & use it to tank for a short burst.

Yet another nurf to any attrition we have.

Oh boy! I hope the devs really think about this one! I use this trait A LOT IN WvW! What is it exactly they are planning to do with this trait? You never clarified, but it sounds like they are removing weakness from it…is that correct?

F’N ANET!! I HOPE THEY DON’T DO THAT!

I didnt really use this trait in pvp but i use it a lot in pve for my condition build. Adding both defence and damage its such a useful trait. IMO they should just leave it alone, but if they really gunna nerf it make it a pvp/pve split so it can still be great in pve!

I hope they can at least buff something else in tier 1 curses… now there’s nothing worth taking in order to get to Banshee’s Wail/Furious Demise. Maybe reaper’s precision?

No no no u guys got it all wrong. We are not suppose to have any defense besides standard attributes like health and armor. Not only are we supposed to get cc’d to no end we are also supposed to suffer full crits from anything and endulge in a more useless profession mechanic.

Besides we are the ones who are meant to be the warriors punching bag; since they are getting a nerf that same patch to their crit on stuns we of course need to get nerfed to make up for that.

Anyways, I don’t consider DS as a reliable source of anything except a fear and a bit more heath. If you run vamp-anything DS is like a foreign mechanic to the class. If you don’t run conditions DS is just some bonus health. All it’s been imo.

No I’m sure a lot of people noticed, infact I removed it from my necromancer already and have begun tinkering around with other traits in the curses line. Hopefully it translates to a proper way to avoid being pressured.

Among all the upcoming changes the nerf to weakening shroud hurt the most indeed. It saddens me that I will have to retire my favorite trait if it happens but I find nothing else in the adept tier worthy enough to replace it to add to our supposed theme of attrition.

They aint nerfing Transfusion nor Unyielding blast, whatcha talking about X3

Well to be serious WS was in a odd place being better than the actual skill, and they are fixing such anomalies. I would have commented how we are skill ok since CB into PM would apply equivalent weakness, but since they are dedicated to ruining staff i guess this is gonna be a true nerf to attrition.

I agree with Sharp, this trait was too good for an adept trait. It’s only a problem because it hasn’t been this way since launch, and nerfs are always bad (in the eyes of most).

They are nerfing most of the builds we really needed the weakness against, and PvE doesn’t get any say in balance.