Guild Wars 2

I don’t like the current layout of the necromancer.
Personally, I think it’s total garbage and doesn’t synergize at all.
Here is a version that I put some effort into trying to improve some things:

I feel like my blood magic changes are especially esports worthy.

___________________________Core Changes___________________________

• Warhorn now inflicts fear instead of daze.
  There are condition mancers and then there are terror mancers; fear synergizes with builds better than daze and this gives more choice for condition vs terror builds.

• Underwater shroud skills now work the same as on land.
  Necromancer is broken underwater and this allows some effects to be turned into traits instead, for balance.

• Well of Blood is now a water field.
  This will make the skill good.

• Life blast is now a 100% projectile finisher.
  Group play and makes sense.

• Increased poison duration of scepter auto attack from 4s to 5s.
• Increased bleed duration of grasping dead (scepter 2) from 7s to 10s.
  These changes make sense with the other changes in curses because lingering curse is changing to a group buff. Scepter doesn’t necessarily need a specific trait of its own so we make some of the traited condition duration baseline instead.

• Axe 1 now cleaves 3 targets.
  It’s something.

_______________________________Spite_______________________________
Spite only has 2 bad traits and they are, not surprisingly, both axe related.

• ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Minor______________________________
• Reaper’s Might
  Good trait.
  ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Adept______________________________
• Bitter Chill
  Good trait.

• Spiteful Renewal
  Good trait.

• Spiteful Talisman
  Good enough trait.
  ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Minor______________________________
• Death’s Embrace
  Good trait.
  ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Master______________________________

• Chill of Death
  Good trait.

• Rending Shroud
  Good trait.

• Unholy Fervor
  Axe skills recharge 20% faster and do 10% more damage.
  ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Minor______________________________
• Siphoned Power
  Good trait.
  ________________________________________________________________
  ____________________________Grandmaster___________________________

• Signets of Suffering
  Good unskillful trait.

• Close to Death
  Good trait.

• Spiteful Spirit
  Internal cooldown removed.
  (Lowest possible shroud cooldown is now 8s instead of 7s: see soul reaping traits)
  Unholy Feast is now a blast finisher.
  This creates a trait that actually competes for a players spot in grandmaster. This will be balanced because it revolves around a certain playstyle and you need to build specifically to try and abuse this trait, but even then, it’s balanced. Engineer has a blast finisher on dodge roll. Necromancer requires death shroud and/or axe.

________________________________Curses________________________________
The changes in curses will rearrange traits in much more synergetic ways (curses is currently horrible). Every trait in curses now has something to do with conditions, though they may not necessarily pertain to condition damage based builds. Every grandmaster trait becomes a totally build defining trait and each one causes a build to play totally different than another.

For example, fear builds have the ability to make much simpler and “easier” builds (such as longbow ranger) with the changes to some abilities. Chilling Darkness also sees a change and necromancer receives another blind ability in trait form in soul reaping.

• ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Minor______________________________
• Barbed Precision
  Good trait.
  ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Adept______________________________
• Terrifying Decent
  Good enough trait.

• Weakening Shroud
  Moved back to minor where it always was. Remove the internal cooldown. Cast enfeeble when you enter death shroud. Simple – keep it that way.

• Plague Sending
  Good unskillful trait.
  ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Minor______________________________
• Parasitic Contagion
  Moved from grandmaster to a minor trait.
  This trait has always been too underpowered to choose as a specific trait but as a minor it makes sense because it works with every build in the curses line. Furious Demise is a relic of the past and no longer belongs in this trait line (should be moved to a new specialization). Target the Weak already raises our critical hit chance in a way that makes more sense.
  ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Master______________________________

• Master of Corruption
  The theme behind the current iteration of this trait makes sense… if we have more ways of dealing with conditions. I attempt to tackle this problem with quite a few balance changes. Trait probably still needs some tweeks.

• Path of Corruption
  Good trait.

• Banshees Wail
  Moved back to curses where it always was.
  This trait is in a good spot here now that it inflcits fear instead of daze.
  ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Minor______________________________
• Target the Weak
  This trait works well with all builds that will go into curses and has hybrid potential. Works well with every curses grandmaster.
  ________________________________________________________________
  ____________________________Grandmaster___________________________

• Chilling Darkness
  Moved to grandmaster.
  Chill foes that you blind; chill duration now scales off of inflicted blind duration.
  No cooldown.

• Terror
  Moved to grandmaster.
  This is a powerful trait and is very build defining. By moving other traits around this becomes a viable option in the grandmaster tier.

• Withering Precision
  Shroud skill 1 transfers conditions on critical hits. Lose 2% life force per condition transferred. Basically a balanced form of the current underwater life blast. Also makes complete sense with the name of the trait, so that’s a bonus.

_____________________________Death Magic_____________________________
Death magic currently has some undesirable traits. With suggested changes, death magic in itself seems to have 3 obvious builds types: minions, power and condition (as well as survivability with everything). Going further into theorycrafting you will discover much more build diversity mixing with other abilities.

• ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Minor______________________________
• Armored Shroud
  Good trait.
  ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Adept______________________________
• Flesh of the Master
  Minion trait.

• Shrouded Removal
  Good trait.

• Putrid Defense
  Poison inflicted foes deal 1% less damage and heal for 1% less per stack.
  A nerf/buff to make the trait seem less meh. Makes corrosive poison cloud a very good poison skill (as well as other abilities)
  ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Minor______________________________
• Deadly Strength
  Moved from master to a minor trait.
  Soul Comprehension is a terrible trait; Deadly Strength actually synergizes with build diversity/other traits, including the first minor trait in Death Magic – Armored Shroud.
  ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Master______________________________

• Necromantic Corruption
  Minion trait.

• Lingering Curse
  Moved/revamped from curses to death magic.
  Nearby allies gain 150 condition damage.
  This trait becomes a group buff similar to Strength in Numbers, Empower Allies or Spotter.

• Vital Persistence
  Moved from soul reaping to death magic. (Removed shroud cooldown reduction)
  Life force drains 50% slower while in death shroud.
  This trait competes with other traits in soul reaping but works really well here.
  ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Minor______________________________
• Unholy Sanctuary
  Moved from grandmaster to a minor trait.
  This trait is too weak for a grandmaster but works well as a minor trait. Works well with the “while being in shroud” minor trait theme in death magic.
  ________________________________________________________________
  ____________________________Grandmaster___________________________

• Death Nova
  Minion trait.

• Beyond the Veil
  Moved/revamped from a minor trait to grandmaster.
  You and nearby allies gain protection when you enter shroud. (If it’s too OP given to allies then make it self only)
  Works well with a plethora of builds/traits and works well with every minor trait in death magic. This trait needs to activate when you enter shroud, not exit it.

• Corrupter’s Fervor
  Interesting trait. Might need some tweaks, but can work here because there are condition traits in the master and adept tier.

_____________________________Blood Magic_____________________________
Blood Magic is supposed to be our support line but it is lacking. The suggested changed open up a few variations of group support such as death shroud support, well/AOE support or an option for “selfish” support with a hint of group support.

• ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Minor______________________________
• Mark of Evasion
  Good trait.
  ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Adept______________________________
• Ritual of Life
  Good enough trait if vampiric rituals pulses protection.

• Quickening Thirst
  Good trait.

• Blood Bond
  Good trait.
  ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Minor______________________________
• Vampiric
  Merged with Vampiric Presence.
  No longer minion specific. Minions no longer siphon for you.
  Blood fiend already does this effect for you. Let it shine!
  You and nearby allies siphon health when you attack.
  There’s no reason to have 2 versions of practically the same trait. Merge them and make a better trait.
  ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Master______________________________

• Soul Marks
  Moved from soul reaping to blood magic.
  This trait bounces from traitline to traitline a lot but if anything, it belongs in blood magic because it’s a mark trait. Blood magics first minor trait is a mark trait. Soul Reaping already has enough competing cooldown reduction traits in current iteration.

• Acrididae
  Last Rites trait deleted because it’s terrible, always has been and always will be.
  Cast signet of the locust whenever you siphon a certain amount of health.
  Amount: 1000 (?)
  Another signet trait like this will synergize really well with quite a few abilities including abilities within blood magic itself but also other traits such as curses grandmaster signets of suffering.

• Unholy Martyr
  Moved from grandmaster to master.
  Effect changed to: shroud 4 now draws conditions from nearby allies to yourself. Gain 1% life force per condition drawn.
  A balanced version of the current underwater version. The previous effect for this trait is too unreliable to be of any use, like plague signets passive. This change gives the player more control over their group support. This change also works well with changes such as the new withering precision trait in curses.
  ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Minor______________________________
• Last Rites
  Good trait.
  ________________________________________________________________
  ____________________________Grandmaster___________________________

• Vampiric Rituals
  Now pulses protection every second.
  Siphon effect changed to: allies standing inside of your wells siphon health with their attacks.
  A slight nerf in some aspects but a nice buff for group play – an aspect that necromancer is lacking.

• Death (New trait)
  You instantly die when you enter death shroud.
  JK I couldn’t think of another (unique) new trait. I don’t get paid for it, afterall.

• Transfusion
  Good trait.

___________________________Soul Reaping___________________________
Soul Reaping has some good traits but too many conflicting traits and a few bad ones. It also has far too many cooldown reduction traits – these need to be spread out more to create build diversity. Soul Reaping will see some trait merges and traits moved around with other trait lines.

• ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Minor______________________________
• Path of Midnight
  Gluttony removed since it’s terrible.
  Reduces recharge on shroud skills by 15%.
  ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Adept______________________________
• Speed of Shadows
  Gain swiftness when you enter shroud. (3s)
  This will be useful. 20% movement speed never was nor ever will be useful. Make it swiftness for 3s like the other boons we can get.

• Dread (New trait)
  Fear also pulses 1s of weakness every second.
  This would be overpowered with other abilities that you can take if it simply inflicted an individual duration of weakness, but if it only pulses along with inflicted fear, it will be fair. The idea is that this will simply reduce the opponents endurance recovery – a nice little buff to fear builds. The damage reduction aspect will have no effect since they will be feared and can’t attack anyway.

• Unyielding Blast
  Good trait.
  ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Minor______________________________
• Last Gasp
  Good trait.
  ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Master______________________________

• Spectral Mastery
  Good trait.

• Reaper’s Protection
  Moved from death magic to soul reaping.
  Now also inflicts fear when downed. Removed 50% increase on fear duration. (Fear has seen buffs in other areas with suggested changes. Example: warhorn)
  This trait doesn’t really work in death magic but works here amongst the other changes, going for a push/pull effect when choosing between condition builds or fear builds. This trait is unique from the other master traits in this tier so it does not compete directly with the others.

• Duumfire
  Moved from grandmaster to master.
  Now that base burning damage was lowered, this skill simply is not good enough for grandmaster anymore. Any buffs to burning stacks could potentially make this overpowered. This trait will be viable in master tier.
  ________________________________________________________________
  _______________________________Minor______________________________
• Strength of Undeath
  Added shroud cooldown reduction. (Decreased cooldown reduction for balance)
  Reduces cooldown of shroud by 20% (down from 30%), increases life force pool by 15% and you deal 5% more damage above 50% life force.
  ________________________________________________________________
  ____________________________Grandmaster___________________________

• Foot in the Grave
  Good trait.

• Death Perception
  Good trait.

• Dark Water(Underwater shroud 2 in trait form)
  Shroud 2 also inflicts blind and poison. (Not pulsing)
  This trait will work really well here for condition builds because of the other options in this trait line. This trait is totally different than the other grandmasters so it will see some use in unique playstyles. This trait has synergy with upcomming reaper builds and can also work well with the Chilling Darkness trait. Also makes sense here because this is a shroud trait which has a reduced cooldown from the first minor in soul reaping – Path of Midnight.

If this patch was made, I would like the changes to axe (they need finishers on #3) and consider a lot of the rest to be nerfs.

Well of blood is a fine enough skill (although I don’t know why it was gutted for no reason), and I would use it if I could remove conditions with my 100% staff 1 finisher. Everything doesn’t have to be a water field.

Even Chilling darkness post nerf is still interesting if I can blast my well to get a chill.

Even something like Warhorn fearing instead of dazing is probably a nerf. I cry inside when my fear gets removed by “for great justice.”

And I always wanted to have withering precision on my power builds, and now that I have it, I don’t want to throw it away, especially when withering shroud enfeeble has next to no range and rarely hits moving players.

nekretaal.6485:

If this patch was made, I would like the changes to axe (they need finishers on #3) and consider a lot of the rest to be nerfs.

Well of blood is a fine enough skill (although I don’t know why it was gutted for no reason), and I would use it if I could remove conditions with my 100% staff 1 finisher. Everything doesn’t have to be a water field.

That does not remove conditions from you. It moves conditions from allies in an AOE radius around targets that the projectile hits.

nekretaal.6485:

Even Chilling darkness post nerf is still interesting if I can blast my well to get a chill.

No, it’s not interesting. It’s garbage and it always was before without the cooldown.

nekretaal.6485:

Even something like Warhorn fearing instead of dazing is probably a nerf. I cry inside when my fear gets removed by “for great justice.”

Fear is superior to daze just like launch is superior to knockdown.

nekretaal.6485:

And I always wanted to have withering precision on my power builds, and now that I have it, I don’t want to throw it away, especially when withering shroud enfeeble has next to no range and rarely hits moving players.

That trait is total garbage. Even when it originally inflicted weakness on critical hits it was garbage.

You basically just said that you use all of the worst possible abilities in the entire necromancer class and then say my suggestions are nerfs. I don’t mind if players disagree with my ideas but they are in every way better than arenanets.

Arenanet is just so bad at balance that it kittens me off. Kittens others off too, that’s why no one plays PvP in this game.

- 3x nerfs to consume conditions which is roflingly sad
- nerf to chilling darkness
- nerf to a bajillion other things
- terrible traits

- massive buffs to signets for some reason

Epic balancing

Zefrost.3425:

• Terrifying Decent
  Good enough trait.

It’s literally just a falling damage trait. Needs to have some other effect.

• Speed of Shadows
  Gain swiftness when you enter shroud. (3s)
  This will be useful. 20% movement speed never was nor ever will be useful. Make it swiftness for 3s like the other boons we can get.

The trait currently gives 25% in DS. Swiftness gives 33%. This is a bonus 8% with considerably less uptime. Not to mention this removes the shroud CD bonus. No thanks.

• Weakening Shroud
  Moved back to minor where it always was. Remove the internal cooldown. Cast enfeeble when you enter death shroud. Simple – keep it that way.

The ICD is for the weakness I believe. And the weakness is very useful.

• Parasitic Contagion
  Moved from grandmaster to a minor trait.
  This trait has always been too underpowered to choose as a specific trait but as a minor it makes sense because it works with every build in the curses line. Furious Demise is a relic of the past and no longer belongs in this trait line (should be moved to a new specialization). Target the Weak already raises our critical hit chance in a way that makes more sense.

Furious Demise is actually very handy for power builds.

• Chilling Darkness
  Moved to grandmaster.
  Chill foes that you blind; chill duration now scales off of inflicted blind duration.
  No cooldown.

Too underwhelming for a GM. Most of our blinds aren’t long enough to make this impactful.

• Duumfire
  Moved from grandmaster to master.
  Now that base burning damage was lowered, this skill simply is not good enough for grandmaster anymore. Any buffs to burning stacks could potentially make this overpowered. This trait will be viable in master tier.

I would never take this, everything else is way more valuable than a single stack of burning.

Everything else isn’t necessarily bad, but it really lacks flavor and none of the changes don’t feel impactful or like they fix anything. Most of the UP traits don’t even need to be revamped, just buffed in numbers.

The Wizland.8435:

It’s literally just a falling damage trait. Needs to have some other effect.

All fall dmg traits are bad… This one was actually better when it had the corruption cd reduction.

The Wizland.8435:

The trait currently gives 25% in DS. Swiftness gives 33%. This is a bonus 8% with considerably less uptime. Not to mention this removes the shroud CD bonus. No thanks.

I agree, this is actually a nerf to the effect. Make it a 50% speed boost like the thief stealth speed trait and suddenly this trait is awesome.

The Wizland.8435:

The ICD is for the weakness I believe. And the weakness is very useful.

I was annoyed that this was moved to gm. I’d happily let it be moved back and restored to its original state, despite any new use it gained.

The Wizland.8435:

Furious Demise is actually very handy for power builds.

Let us condi necros dream. If every condi necro has to take curses, the minors shouldn’t be useless to condi necros.

The Wizland.8435:

Too underwhelming for a GM. Most of our blinds aren’t long enough to make this impactful.

I agree. This isn’t a viable choice for a grandmaster. It needs some extra kick to make it worthy of use.

The Wizland.8435:

I would never take this, everything else is way more valuable than a single stack of burning.

I honestly think that this trait should stay in the grandmaster tier and gain a significant buff. This is probably the worst burning trait in the game. It doesn’t even have a place on condi builds. Also, Dark Water fails as a trait because RS 2 inflicts poison and DS 2 inflicts chill, negating its synergy with chilling darkness. Overlapping conditions are overlapping.

The Wizland.8435:

Everything else isn’t necessarily bad, but it really lacks flavor and none of the changes don’t feel impactful or like they fix anything. Most of the UP traits don’t even need to be revamped, just buffed in numbers.

Actually, in the eyes of a terrormancer, most of these changes are awesome. The traits we desperately wanted to run together but couldn’t are now usable together. However, I have a extra few nitpicks:

Zefrost.3425:

• Terror
  Moved to grandmaster.
  This is a powerful trait and is very build defining. By moving other traits around this becomes a viable option in the grandmaster tier.

I like how you merged Reaper’s Protection into Fear of Death, but Master of Terror needed to go into Terror. No excuses there

Zefrost.3425:

• Master of Corruption
  The theme behind the current iteration of this trait makes sense… if we have more ways of dealing with conditions. I attempt to tackle this problem with quite a few balance changes. Trait probably still needs some tweeks.
• Path of Corruption
  Good trait.

Am I the only one that sees something wrong with this? Two traits with the word “corruption” in them competing for a spot on a build? The penalty on master of corruption is undeniably stupid, but if the positives of both of these traits were combined, we’d have a really nice trait that makes sense. Make it happen, I say.

• Soul Marks
  Moved from soul reaping to blood magic.
  This trait bounces from traitline to traitline a lot but if anything, it belongs in blood magic because it’s a mark trait. Blood magics first minor trait is a mark trait. Soul Reaping already has enough competing cooldown reduction traits in current iteration.

Actually, this trait is WAY better as a soul reaping adept trait. For a condition build with few life force gaining sources, it is amazing, and it allows for more frequent staff fears.

Lastly, I really like the idea to change warhorn daze to fear but shame for thinking something had to be nerfed just to get that one extra fear.