Guild Wars 2

I am happy none of the people in this thread aren’t on the balancing team lol.

Realistically, the best fix that could be made in terms of the class in my opinion would be to swap out Foul Current( trident #3 ability) with Dark Path (DS 2). The unrealiability of Dark Path is reducing the utility of our DS by 25% if it doesnt land. When you go against any player in pvp with 1/2 a brain will dodge/stealth/walk 2 feet from the path 90%+ of the time.

The poison field /weakness finisher would be amazing for pretty much any spec. As well as it would also give non scepter/ staff specs an access to the poison condition. The guaranteed mobility of the spell would give necromancers a much needed “consistant” gap closer/ space we so desperately need.

P.S. More finishers of any kind on a 600 range weapon or less would be awesome even on a long cooldown.

Kravick.4906:

Bhawb.7408:

Congrats, you gave the enemy team 10 extra seconds worth of points, plus the time you wasted in the first fight, and however long it takes you to actually finally kill them. If you count wasting a minute to take a single point that is going to be recapped pretty easily, a win, then I think we have different views of how to accomplish objectives.

No one is talking about sPvP. There is a reason very few people play sPvP any more.

yeah its sad the devs can’t see this and devote more time to areas where the players spend most of their time like WvW.

Apparently the devs egos are too big to admit spvp failed hard in this incarnation of GW and move on to improving WvW and class balance/bugs.

Dredlord.8076:

Kravick.4906:

Bhawb.7408:

Congrats, you gave the enemy team 10 extra seconds worth of points, plus the time you wasted in the first fight, and however long it takes you to actually finally kill them. If you count wasting a minute to take a single point that is going to be recapped pretty easily, a win, then I think we have different views of how to accomplish objectives.

No one is talking about sPvP. There is a reason very few people play sPvP any more.

yeah its sad the devs can’t see this and devote more time to areas where the players spend most of their time like WvW.

Apparently the devs egos are too big to admit spvp failed hard in this incarnation of GW and move on to improving WvW and class balance/bugs.

The “big” wvw update is coming in 2 days. Let’s see how that goes before concluding. ^^

CHIPS.6018:

Dredlord.8076:

Kravick.4906:

Bhawb.7408:

Congrats, you gave the enemy team 10 extra seconds worth of points, plus the time you wasted in the first fight, and however long it takes you to actually finally kill them. If you count wasting a minute to take a single point that is going to be recapped pretty easily, a win, then I think we have different views of how to accomplish objectives.

No one is talking about sPvP. There is a reason very few people play sPvP any more.

yeah its sad the devs can’t see this and devote more time to areas where the players spend most of their time like WvW.

Apparently the devs egos are too big to admit spvp failed hard in this incarnation of GW and move on to improving WvW and class balance/bugs.

The “big” wvw update is coming in 2 days. Let’s see how that goes before concluding. ^^

To be honest, I’m not holding my breath. Thus far ANets patches have been a lot of small and tiny things that don’t really amount to very much. The biggest thing was fractals so far, and all that ended up being is 9 very short mini dungeons that you do 3 of at a time. The only reason people even do those is because its the only source of ascended rings and back items. Most PUGs I’ve joined have said they don’t really find the dungeons all that fun because of X Y or Z.

And the dredge fractal? God, why is it that every time the dredge are involved it always ends up being one of the most god awful things to run.

Well we can hope, but what we know about Anet balancing so far, they usually don’t touch the most powerful builds. Or if they do take something small away from them, they also give something positive somewhere else, even buffs! So if the main builds on a lower end profession aren’t up to snuff they also won’t make those better to catch up, but rather will buff the least used weapons and abilities of those professions, which usually end up still not as good as even the most used builds on professions that are already behind. They will fix bugs that are far from the most important, like something underwater. In the end the major balance issues with the game do not get addressed, or do so at a snails pace.

Kravick.4906:

CHIPS.6018:

Dredlord.8076:

Kravick.4906:

Bhawb.7408:

Congrats, you gave the enemy team 10 extra seconds worth of points, plus the time you wasted in the first fight, and however long it takes you to actually finally kill them. If you count wasting a minute to take a single point that is going to be recapped pretty easily, a win, then I think we have different views of how to accomplish objectives.

No one is talking about sPvP. There is a reason very few people play sPvP any more.

yeah its sad the devs can’t see this and devote more time to areas where the players spend most of their time like WvW.

Apparently the devs egos are too big to admit spvp failed hard in this incarnation of GW and move on to improving WvW and class balance/bugs.

The “big” wvw update is coming in 2 days. Let’s see how that goes before concluding. ^^

To be honest, I’m not holding my breath. Thus far ANets patches have been a lot of small and tiny things that don’t really amount to very much. The biggest thing was fractals so far, and all that ended up being is 9 very short mini dungeons that you do 3 of at a time. The only reason people even do those is because its the only source of ascended rings and back items. Most PUGs I’ve joined have said they don’t really find the dungeons all that fun because of X Y or Z.

And the dredge fractal? God, why is it that every time the dredge are involved it always ends up being one of the most god awful things to run.

I enjoy fractals. I have about 50 pristine relics, and as many ascended rings as I might need or my necro and 80 alt. I run them because they are what I would consider one of the few PVE environments that are difficult at the top end of this game. Even a properly outfitted group will have little issues in fractals at 30+, but at least its harder than COF and open-world. Also trying to do fractals in the 30+ range with odd group setups can be infuriatingly difficult, which is oddly enjoyable.

Risk vs. reward is absolutely not there. Once you have your rings there is no reason to stay unless you have a hard love for the fractal skins, but its still something to do until they release the WvW patch. You get more mileage out of doing world dragons/bosses until they nerf that to the ground next patch.

Unfortunately, I heard last evening anet commented that the progression in WvW would feel really slow, which means those of us that only play a few hours a day at best are going to get little out of it. Heres’ hoping they added some other good content with the progression system.

Kravick.4906:

And the dredge fractal? God, why is it that every time the dredge are involved it always ends up being one of the most god awful things to run.

Well they are actually useful in SE, also Well of corruption kittenes~

The whole comparison of cripples/chills between classes is not genuine. Like the comparison with Ele chills? Ele’s can only use one weapon and so while they have a higher number of skills that chill, they are all tied to separate weapons. Necros have the most access to chills, which is all that really matters. Their AoE cripple abilities (Sc 2 and Axe 3) have long durations on short cooldowns.

The issue with players being able to get away from the Necro has to do mainly with the abundance of condition removals, plus the mobility skills of other classes (also has to do with Necro’s lack of swiftness and teleports, but that seems to be by design so I will disregard that). For example it’s quite easy to chase a warrior who has the worse condition removal in the game plus has no teleports.

I doubt much is going to be done with condition removal, and you can easily make the argument that is intended, provides counterplay, etc. But I see no reason why mobility skills shouldn’t be affected by cripple/chill. RTL, whirlwind, etc. should move slower when they are crippled/chilled. IMO it should affect the distance you travel while dodging as well. Only thing that shouldn’t be affected is teleports.

TLDR: it’s not the lack of cripple/chills that makes it so people can run away from Necros, it’s the effectiveness of those cripples/chills.

Ideas and opinions on skills

Spectral skills

• Change wall to a dome
• Add vigor to armor
• Change grasp to a leap finisher and add chill and darkness

Signets

• cut CD on all of them in half
• Spite effects are too short for its CD
• Locust health steal is useless but 25% speed boost has replaced the horn and spectral walk for most farming and map crossing. Traiting for spectral skills is definitely less important for me, now, although I am aware of the special usage cases.
• Undeath should revive dead as well as downed given its long CD
• Plague should heal as well as transfer conditions

Wells are fine

Marks
Fear needs shorter CD rather than more damage

General
Necromancer needs a special curse at precision 30 that no other profession has
It does not need to cause damage but it should be anoying. Perhaps a curse that prohibits boons for several seconds.

Anchoku.8142:

Ideas and opinions on skills

Spectral skills

• Change wall to a dome
• Add stability to armor
• Change grasp to forced enemy shadowstep

Signets
- Cut CD of Spite and Locust
- Give Locust higher damage, remove heal pre target part, make it a full lifesteal and be a ground targeted aoe (2.4k base with 0.4 scailing 1200 range 240 radius)
- Undeath doesnt lose passive upon use
- Plague signet spreads personal and allied conditions in 600 aoe

Wells – Power and Darkness need base cd put to 45 seconds too or be given the same damage setup as corruption

Marks
Fine

General
Specific minior trait at 25 points pre trait line that changes DS to work with setup (secondary condition application, enemy boon stripping, boon application, lifesteal, spectral effect/more LF generation).

Fixed X3

I would love a debuff on the target that would cause all buffs cast to flip for 5 seconds…. be sort of like a single target version of well of corruption strapped to their back. Wouldn’t effect buffs already on the target, but could be used to punish buff spammers and to head off a guardian about to pop all his buffs. Add a nice skill element to it, making it a proactive skill instead of a reactive skill like corruption boon.

When you think about it, it woudl be a lot like confusion, in that it would be more designed to stop activity. Make it not-cleanseable too.

CHIPS.6018:

7) Rapid firing – I think most of necro’s skills are rapid fire. Scepter and dagger both attacks pretty rapidly. Channelling skills are all rapid fire. Marks and wells can be casted quickly and in succession. The only exception would be staff 1, which attacks pretty slowly. 9/10

I tend to disagree with this a lot. The necromancer as a class is most defined by his utilities, and those are on such long cooldowns that you will spend a lot of time auto attacking.

@Andele

I could live with your suggestions. ;-)

What Necromancer seems to need most is more incoming damage reduction condition time, whether from longer condition time, shorter CD, added avoidance mechanisms, whatever.

The problem with that statement is it reads like, “I want an OP class,” and there are plenty of those complaints in all professions. The important point we are trying to make is there are some builds that are under-powered that we would like to fix so we have more equal performing selections among the build types (than we already have.)

Necromancer also has difficulty with bosses because of things like the bleed cap, which is there for good reason but makes us feel kitten when other professions in a group load up the boss without our help. Arenanet has been improving damage and mobility for the Necromancer since release because the Necro-punching-bag idea was not as perfect as it probably sounded.

Arenanet cannot just add toughness or more HP because that would draw more aggro from bosses, defeating its purpose and more HP requires more healing. More non-damaging conditions would probably make Necro OP in normal PvE. In the end, all the developers can do is to make the profession more like other professions with similar damage and mobility so the balance in game play is not too far off from the standard and that makes Necromancer not so much a master of undead and curses.

In a way, I would rather Arenanet find a way to tweak the damage scaling for conditions versus bosses and bursts, or come up with a new condition so the profession retains more of its specialty than add direct damage and more mobility.

Other ideas
Decrease DS transformation CD so we can blink in and out of it faster.

About Fear, the Defiant patch really nerfed one of staffs more important uses in dungeons. That patch made me sad but I could understand given Warrior’s 3s close range Fear. It would be nice if Necromancer had an interrupt or something to provide more support in dungeons. Fear and Spectral Grasp used to be more helpful but Defiant kind of killed that by pulling two of the teeth that actually scaled up with opponent level.

As expected this patch didn’t help us much. But hopefully Anet is reading our feedbacks and working on fixes. ^^

CHIPS.6018:

As expected this patch didn’t help us much. But hopefully Anet is reading our feedbacks and working on fixes. ^^

LOL! You mean like they fixed Engineer? Buffed the damage of the build everyone hates to play (Turrets). Destroyed the build with actual damage in it (100nades).

It’s all the same to me. My wife plays a Turret Engi and she’s ecstatic about the patch. But it doesn’t bode well for Necro, except we don’t really have any OP Damage builds to nerf. Maybe that’ll be a blessing in disguise.

I posted this in another one, but I do enjoy this conversation quite a bit. I do think a few requests are a bit overboard, but I think we do need some changes.

Personally, I just want to see more ways to build DS without being interrupted or relying on deaths. If they could scale Life Force collection based on the damage we take that would be the ultimate way to go.

Essentially the larger percentage of your total health that’s taken the more Life Force you gain outside of Death Shroud. So if you are sitting at 21k health and you get hit for 14k you would get 20 percent LF. If you are sitting at 30k health and take the same hit you would only get 10 or 15 percent LF. While condition damage and small hits would only give you a minute source of LF per tick.

This would make it more of an attrition game since players would know that a fight with a 30 point Soul Reaping tank class could last quite some time.

Granted if someone took the 5 percent talent and built a tank out of it. he could essentially have a full DS every 5 seconds.

PinCushion.7390:

CHIPS.6018:

As expected this patch didn’t help us much. But hopefully Anet is reading our feedbacks and working on fixes. ^^

LOL! You mean like they fixed Engineer? Buffed the damage of the build everyone hates to play (Turrets). Destroyed the build with actual damage in it (100nades).

It’s all the same to me. My wife plays a Turret Engi and she’s ecstatic about the patch. But it doesn’t bode well for Necro, except we don’t really have any OP Damage builds to nerf. Maybe that’ll be a blessing in disguise.

Like I have said numerous times. The issue with the game is not the Necromancer. It’s the Niche roles that other classes are forced into because their other specs are so much worse than the niche specs.

We are really well balanced, every other class wishes they had the variety of builds that we have available.

Bas.7406:

PinCushion.7390:

CHIPS.6018:

As expected this patch didn’t help us much. But hopefully Anet is reading our feedbacks and working on fixes. ^^

LOL! You mean like they fixed Engineer? Buffed the damage of the build everyone hates to play (Turrets). Destroyed the build with actual damage in it (100nades).

It’s all the same to me. My wife plays a Turret Engi and she’s ecstatic about the patch. But it doesn’t bode well for Necro, except we don’t really have any OP Damage builds to nerf. Maybe that’ll be a blessing in disguise.

Like I have said numerous times. The issue with the game is not the Necromancer. It’s the Niche roles that other classes are forced into because their other specs are so much worse than the niche specs.

We are really well balanced, every other class wishes they had the variety of builds that we have available.

As long as OP niche builds exist for any class, every other balanced class will be compared to it. Luckily ANet has been kind of ok with nerfing in a controlled way. The problem is that it takes them so long that when they finally get around to it the niche build has developed into an entire playstyle, and sometimes even an entire culture.

Add to this that PvE is so trivial in most of the game it drastically undervalues defensive and support abilities, and you get a culture that is always looking for the highest DPS wherever they can find it. This devalues any profession, any trait line, and any skill that doesn’t fit into the culture of MOARZERKDPSPLOX!

Now, we put the Necro profession in this context and it’s no wonder so many players feel that it’s underpowered. The core mechanic of the Necro is a defensive one, and most skills are centered around defensive conditions stacking (chill/cripple/weakness), and consistent damage over time. Players end up asking the same question over and over again. Where’s the burst?!?

Well if what Bas is saying IS correct, what evidence is there that ANet are trimming the other profs down to our level? NONE (in fact the opposite..epidemc nerf anyone). This is just the old MMO argument “so-and-so class is OP…devs pls nerf it” and we all know where that goes.

The alternative then is to seek an increase in necro abilities to match because that argument above will get us nowhere.

EDIT: and the line of least resistance (effort) for the devs is to buff one or two of our abilities rather than nerf one or two abilities for 3 or 4 professions. So if buffing us is improbable I would say nerfing the others is even more of an improbability purely on the effort required.

Lets assume here for a second that necromancers have the largest number of viable builds in the game (because I’m not going to go through the impossible attempt to prove it), and that most other classes just have 1-2 really great builds. What is easier, nerfing a few abilities across those other classes so that their other builds are now more viable, and their “OP” builds are now in line, or buffing every single non-OP build in every single class until they are on par with the OP builds? The reality is it is easier for them to trim back on a relatively small number of builds to bring them in line with the rest of the game, instead of buffing the entire game around those few builds.

Oldbugga.7029:

Well if what Bas is saying IS correct, what evidence is there that ANet are trimming the other profs down to our level? NONE (in fact the opposite..epidemc nerf anyone). This is just the old MMO argument “so-and-so class is OP…devs pls nerf it” and we all know where that goes.

The alternative then is to seek an increase in necro abilities to match because that argument above will get us nowhere.

EDIT: and the line of least resistance (effort) for the devs is to buff one or two of our abilities rather than nerf one or two abilities for 3 or 4 professions. So if buffing us is improbable I would say nerfing the others is even more of an improbability purely on the effort required.

They just dropped the hammer for the second time on Engineer 100 Nades builds, and put an interesting nerf on the Thieves perma stealth builds (though that’s not the main issue). Engineers are mainly going to be HGH builds now which should be even more fun.

They nerfed the snot out of 30 arcana power builds for ele’s. Heartseaker got nerfed, Pistol Whip got nerfed, Poison on thieves got nerfed. Guardian’s boon Save Yourself and the healing from the Shouts got nerfed severely in one of the first patches.

They put a nice across the board nerf on quickness which will bring Mesmer and Warrior Burst down a bit. I haven’t taken a look at the Elementalist tree, but unless they hammer cantrips they will stay the same.

Oldbugga.7029:

Well if what Bas is saying IS correct, what evidence is there that ANet are trimming the other profs down to our level? NONE (in fact the opposite..epidemc nerf anyone). This is just the old MMO argument “so-and-so class is OP…devs pls nerf it” and we all know where that goes.

The alternative then is to seek an increase in necro abilities to match because that argument above will get us nowhere.

EDIT: and the line of least resistance (effort) for the devs is to buff one or two of our abilities rather than nerf one or two abilities for 3 or 4 professions. So if buffing us is improbable I would say nerfing the others is even more of an improbability purely on the effort required.

It isn’t about the line of least resistance. It’s about creating a level playing field where every profession has a variety of builds with which they can contribute in both PvE and PvP. In PvE it prevents content from becoming (more) trivialized, and prevents players from being shoehorned into roles and builds that they may not actually enjoy. Both of these add to the game’s overall longevity and marketability. In PvP it prevents matches from becoming foregone conclusions based purely on which group has the “correct” class composition, and also creates a certain amount of unpredictability in gameplay. How many times have you seen a Warrior with a Greatsword in PvP or WvW and knew exactly what he was going to do and how to react to it? That’s a problem. There aren’t enough ways to build a solid Greatsword Warrior that players actually want to use, so GS Warriors are painfully predictable to the point of being boring. That’s just an example, but there are countless others. D/D Elementalists are another build that is very potent, but also incredibly predictable.

Bhawb.7408:

Lets assume here for a second that necromancers have the largest number of viable builds in the game (because I’m not going to go through the impossible attempt to prove it), and that most other classes just have 1-2 really great builds. What is easier, nerfing a few abilities across those other classes so that their other builds are now more viable, and their “OP” builds are now in line, or buffing every single non-OP build in every single class until they are on par with the OP builds? The reality is it is easier for them to trim back on a relatively small number of builds to bring them in line with the rest of the game, instead of buffing the entire game around those few builds.

True, but nerfing a few OP builds (that a majority are playing) makes people mad. Buffing other professions, many won’t even notice their opponents got stronger, as long as their own class isn’t nerfed they are content.

They seem more onboard with moving stuff up than moving stuff down.

Unfortunately balancing in this way looks like it will take years. And its not like they are even buffing all our viable builds, but lately more things on the periphery, that no one is using anyway.

I think if we can take one positive thing from ANet, is that they don’t seem all that concerned about people being mad about something. I could very well see them nerfing OP builds, even with the community outrage they will get.

I think they are very cognizant of opinion actually, as they have stated many times they don’t want to balance in that ‘whack-a-mole’ fashion as in some past games, that caused community uproar. If one build is a 10 and the common playing field is a 7, they’d rather move that 10 down by .5 every patch than move it down to the playing field in one fell swoop.

Yes, because that removes the ridiculous pattern they had in GW1, where the flavor of the month could be expected to eat nerf-hammer from Thor himself with the next patch, and then that build would be totally useless from that point on. Then the next flavor of the month would come by, and that one would take a hammer to the face, and this cycle repeated ad nauseum.

I would much rather they drop it slowly, because realistically you can’t necessarily know for sure what happens to other builds when you nerf an ability that is shared, they also don’t have a convenient Dragonball style power scouter, so while they know a build is too strong, they don’t know exactly how much it needs to be brought down to be in line without nerfing it into the ground.

Thing is this patch is more a nerf for us than a buff, as Epidemic is probably our strongest skill and took a hit, especially the stealth nerf of it only hitting 4 people now. That is a 20% effectiveness reduction! Lame. Then we still have Ele’s running around as kings of whatever they want to do, barely getting tinkered with on the edges at best.

I was really expecting they would make some moves toward solving what are commonly discussed as our bigger weaknesses. They appear to think we are fine, or finished.

They also changed two duration rune sets, nightmare and lich, reducing their 4 pc bonus to 10% from 20%. I see this as yet another nerf to Necro’s, as I don’t know of other profs that make use of these commonly.

The “line of least resistance” comment was picking up on a comment in another thread about it being “too much work” to adjust minion/pet AI for all professions…..too much work there but in this thread not as important???? And I DO think it is of primary consideration given the workload/issues the devs have to address…not good business sense to do otherwise.

Edit: To me, and this is personal opinion, there is too much trying to “win the argument” approaches to these issues rather than a coordinated and coherent strategy for our profession. Puffing out the chest feathers might make us feel important but it is in our own eyes….onlookers and outside interested parties like the devs are put off by the “noise” and posturing. Very strong stances either way ARE seen as outliers in opinion analysis and lose some of their impact (sometimes wrongly) purely because they are seen as either a “fanboi” or a “hater” positions. There are some really valid points both ways here but much is lost in the noise.

Anyway, off for some more chemo….that’ll shut me up for a bit.

Pendragon.8735:

Thing is this patch is more a nerf for us than a buff, as Epidemic is probably our strongest skill and took a hit, especially the stealth nerf of it only hitting 4 people now. That is a 20% effectiveness reduction! Lame. Then we still have Ele’s running around as kings of whatever they want to do, barely getting tinkered with on the edges at best.

I was really expecting they would make some moves toward solving what are commonly discussed as our bigger weaknesses. They appear to think we are fine, or finished.

Has that 4 been tested? I heard it was tested and it was still 5.

PinCushion.7390:

Oldbugga.7029:

Well if what Bas is saying IS correct, what evidence is there that ANet are trimming the other profs down to our level? NONE (in fact the opposite..epidemc nerf anyone). This is just the old MMO argument “so-and-so class is OP…devs pls nerf it” and we all know where that goes.

The alternative then is to seek an increase in necro abilities to match because that argument above will get us nowhere.

EDIT: and the line of least resistance (effort) for the devs is to buff one or two of our abilities rather than nerf one or two abilities for 3 or 4 professions. So if buffing us is improbable I would say nerfing the others is even more of an improbability purely on the effort required.

It isn’t about the line of least resistance. It’s about creating a level playing field where every profession has a variety of builds with which they can contribute in both PvE and PvP. In PvE it prevents content from becoming (more) trivialized, and prevents players from being shoehorned into roles and builds that they may not actually enjoy. Both of these add to the game’s overall longevity and marketability. In PvP it prevents matches from becoming foregone conclusions based purely on which group has the “correct” class composition, and also creates a certain amount of unpredictability in gameplay. How many times have you seen a Warrior with a Greatsword in PvP or WvW and knew exactly what he was going to do and how to react to it? That’s a problem. There aren’t enough ways to build a solid Greatsword Warrior that players actually want to use, so GS Warriors are painfully predictable to the point of being boring. That’s just an example, but there are countless others. D/D Elementalists are another build that is very potent, but also incredibly predictable.

Incredibly well worded. Thank you!

Bas.7406:

Has that 4 been tested? I heard it was tested and it was still 5.

I’m going by other thread where someone said they tested and got 4 not counting the target, who of course suffers no damage or conditions from us anyway. But I can check it.

Edit: Ok I tested it, and thankfully, you were right, it is still 5 other creatures around the target. Phew, because that would have been probably even worse than the LoS change.

PinCushion.7390:

Oldbugga.7029:

Well if what Bas is saying IS correct, what evidence is there that ANet are trimming the other profs down to our level? NONE (in fact the opposite..epidemc nerf anyone). This is just the old MMO argument “so-and-so class is OP…devs pls nerf it” and we all know where that goes.

The alternative then is to seek an increase in necro abilities to match because that argument above will get us nowhere.

EDIT: and the line of least resistance (effort) for the devs is to buff one or two of our abilities rather than nerf one or two abilities for 3 or 4 professions. So if buffing us is improbable I would say nerfing the others is even more of an improbability purely on the effort required.

It isn’t about the line of least resistance. It’s about creating a level playing field where every profession has a variety of builds with which they can contribute in both PvE and PvP. In PvE it prevents content from becoming (more) trivialized, and prevents players from being shoehorned into roles and builds that they may not actually enjoy. Both of these add to the game’s overall longevity and marketability. In PvP it prevents matches from becoming foregone conclusions based purely on which group has the “correct” class composition, and also creates a certain amount of unpredictability in gameplay. How many times have you seen a Warrior with a Greatsword in PvP or WvW and knew exactly what he was going to do and how to react to it? That’s a problem. There aren’t enough ways to build a solid Greatsword Warrior that players actually want to use, so GS Warriors are painfully predictable to the point of being boring. That’s just an example, but there are countless others. D/D Elementalists are another build that is very potent, but also incredibly predictable.

You have to realize that predictability was ANet’s design intent. That’s the whole reason they had weapon sets in the first place, why there’s no cast bars but unique cast animations, etc. They wanted players to have a visual cue on what to look out for so they could time their dodges and stuff.

The lack of viable, unique builds and play-styles is something else entirely. That is why IMO each class should be balanced around roles. Each role typically necessitates different play-styles and builds, and if you give each class say 3 or so viable roles they can fill it is a nice balance between predictability and varied play.

Skyro.3108:

You have to realize that predictability was ANet’s design intent. That’s the whole reason they had weapon sets in the first place, why there’s no cast bars but unique cast animations, etc. They wanted players to have a visual cue on what to look out for so they could time their dodges and stuff.

The lack of viable, unique builds and play-styles is something else entirely. That is why IMO each class should be balanced around roles. Each role typically necessitates different play-styles and builds, and if you give each class say 3 or so viable roles they can fill it is a nice balance between predictability and varied play.

That’s an interesting idea, but that would put them back into realizing that leaving a role system was a bad idea. Since their whole premise was leaving roles behind and just having this completely dynamic play, I am not sure they will do that.

Once you start developing roles, people will fall into a holy trinity WoW type or LoL type roles and then we are back to what they wanted to leave behind. Not sure that’s possible with what they want to do with the game.

Bas.7406:

Skyro.3108:

You have to realize that predictability was ANet’s design intent. That’s the whole reason they had weapon sets in the first place, why there’s no cast bars but unique cast animations, etc. They wanted players to have a visual cue on what to look out for so they could time their dodges and stuff.

The lack of viable, unique builds and play-styles is something else entirely. That is why IMO each class should be balanced around roles. Each role typically necessitates different play-styles and builds, and if you give each class say 3 or so viable roles they can fill it is a nice balance between predictability and varied play.

That’s an interesting idea, but that would put them back into realizing that leaving a role system was a bad idea. Since their whole premise was leaving roles behind and just having this completely dynamic play, I am not sure they will do that.

Once you start developing roles, people will fall into a holy trinity WoW type or LoL type roles and then we are back to what they wanted to leave behind. Not sure that’s possible with what they want to do with the game.

Their basic combat system originally was designed roles. They were supposed to be support, damage, control. Support morphed into bunker, damage is always just damage, and control is virtually non-existant. If each class was able to fill each of these 3 roles, but in different ways to varied play, that is all you really need.

As with most things in life, you want a balance. You don’t want hard set rules on comps, but you do want the ability to optimization your composition to some extent. If all 3 classes could serve these 3 basic roles people could switch up their roles on the fly to fit their composition.

CHIPS.6018:

The “big” wvw update is coming in 2 days. Let’s see how that goes before concluding. ^^

ok

CHIPS.6018:

As expected this patch didn’t help us much. But hopefully Anet is reading our feedbacks and working on fixes. ^^

yeah…….lets hope more though this time?

What I saw of the patch notes seems to indicate Arenanet is trimming the OP builds very slightly and buffing the non-viable builds for other professions.

Necromancer is, in one sense, a golden standard for profession design. Sure, signets an issue and a spectral build is not quite there yet but there are plenty of builds that offer reasonably capable play without being really OP. No matter what build a Necromancer has, the opponent will get several chances to recover.

And that is what Arenanet should be looking into for other classes: nerfing the OP builds and making other builds capable of surviving at least three, or so, moves. The end result should be a battle of skill, not a battle of the fastest crit-bursts.

I am rather glad Necromancer did not suffer a truly terrible nerf like with the Defiant patch or the “adjustments” to DS coming out of pre-release testing. For PvE trash-mob encounters, Necromancer is very powerful so there is always a chance of a reduction to damage or conditions there.

Just the two builds noted above are left to flesh out a full suite of Necromancer tool sets. I rather hope Arenanet realizes just how balanced the profession is and continues to work on the remaining build types as an example of how to provide a variety of builds on other professions.

Bas.7406:

I posted this in another one, but I do enjoy this conversation quite a bit. I do think a few requests are a bit overboard, but I think we do need some changes.

Personally, I just want to see more ways to build DS without being interrupted or relying on deaths. If they could scale Life Force collection based on the damage we take that would be the ultimate way to go.

Essentially the larger percentage of your total health that’s taken the more Life Force you gain outside of Death Shroud. So if you are sitting at 21k health and you get hit for 14k you would get 20 percent LF. If you are sitting at 30k health and take the same hit you would only get 10 or 15 percent LF. While condition damage and small hits would only give you a minute source of LF per tick.

This would make it more of an attrition game since players would know that a fight with a 30 point Soul Reaping tank class could last quite some time.

Granted if someone took the 5 percent talent and built a tank out of it. he could essentially have a full DS every 5 seconds.

I am glad we agree on this. We definitely need more reliable and consistent sources of LF regen. It shouldn’t be such a huge difference when we face a tanker build and when we face a high mobility+high blast build.

Oldbugga.7029:

Well if what Bas is saying IS correct, what evidence is there that ANet are trimming the other profs down to our level? NONE (in fact the opposite..epidemc nerf anyone). This is just the old MMO argument “so-and-so class is OP…devs pls nerf it” and we all know where that goes.

The alternative then is to seek an increase in necro abilities to match because that argument above will get us nowhere.

EDIT: and the line of least resistance (effort) for the devs is to buff one or two of our abilities rather than nerf one or two abilities for 3 or 4 professions. So if buffing us is improbable I would say nerfing the others is even more of an improbability purely on the effort required.

Well stealth thieves and mesmers took a huge hit today. So I think Anet is trimming OP builds while buffing under used builds.

For example thieves might be slightly overpowered. But they also have many underpowered builds that no one uses.

Pendragon.8735:

Thing is this patch is more a nerf for us than a buff, as Epidemic is probably our strongest skill and took a hit, especially the stealth nerf of it only hitting 4 people now. That is a 20% effectiveness reduction! Lame. Then we still have Ele’s running around as kings of whatever they want to do, barely getting tinkered with on the edges at best.

I was really expecting they would make some moves toward solving what are commonly discussed as our bigger weaknesses. They appear to think we are fine, or finished.

They also changed two duration rune sets, nightmare and lich, reducing their 4 pc bonus to 10% from 20%. I see this as yet another nerf to Necro’s, as I don’t know of other profs that make use of these commonly.

I know that the Epidemic nerf sort of sucks. But a part of me is actually very glad that they nerfed Epidemic. I feel that Epidemic, one single skill in the necro’s list, is what’s holding Anet back from buffing other skills.

e.g. Please buff Dark Pact. We need an AoE immobilize skill to be the best snaring class in the game.

Answer: No! You already have Epidemic! That makes your underpowerd skill Dark Pact perfectly fine.

e.g. Please buff Dark Pact. We need an AoE immobilize skill to be the best snaring class in the game.

Answer: No! You already have Epidemic! That makes your underpowerd skill Dark Pact perfectly fine.

You can replace “Dark Pact” with many other skills, and get the same NO from Anet due to Epidemic.

So I hope this nerf on Epidemic opens up doors for buffs on other skills. Epidemic shouldn’t be the all and be all for the necro. It should be a “support” and “utility” skill that further strengthens the other “already balanced” necro skills.

The next thing Anet should look at is our “unusually” high health pool. This might be another hinder to necros receiving buffs that we need. I would gladly take a 10-20% health pool nerf if that means we get more powerful skills.

I’ve been using a Thief in WvW lately, and I agree that Thief is just better at Attrition. S/D and D/P and the only professions that can get away from me are other thieves and SOME Elementalists.

Infiltrator Strike, Heartstrike spam for gap closer, Shadowstep, Steal, etc… Just so fun