Guild Wars 2

they seriously take forever to cast anything i mean c’mon anet please cut down the casting time if not make some stuff instant !!!

Wesnoth.1705:

Use Death magics first trait to have some extra 400 toughness while chanelling to make it as an effect than. Whining will not do any good here.

Casting time not Channel time.

i have no problem with channeling . but the casting time it out right dumb we need faster cast times for a large part of our skills .

Apart from the odd mistimed Epidemic (which IS frustrating, I grant you) could you give some concrete examples and an explanation of the kind of scenarios that it’s been troublesome… Because I honestly don’t see it

look at the skill list and look at the cast times. Individually it’s not a problem (except focus 5 which truly does have an excessive cast no matter how you look at it), it’s just that across the board we seem to hard a higher average cast time then most, with so many 3/4 and 1s cast skills, that it makes us play a bit sluggishly.

War Mourner.5168:

look at the skill list and look at the cast times. Individually it’s not a problem (except focus 5 which truly does have an excessive cast no matter how you look at it), it’s just that across the board we seem to hard a higher average cast time then most, with so many 3/4 and 1s cast skills, that it makes us play a bit sluggishly.

Pretty cool how other classes can hit you a zillion times in melee before you can get most casts off, huh?

Cast times are fine, its the travel times of skills that needs a buff. (Necrotic Grasp, Dark Path and Spectral Grasp) Most people can outrun the travel time with Swiftness and have the skill fizzle away.

Ascii.9726:

Cast times are fine, its the travel times of skills that needs a buff. (Necrotic Grasp, Dark Path and Spectral Grasp) Most people can outrun the travel time with Swiftness and have the skill fizzle away.

Focus skills have ridiculous cast times, so do signets, Minions, wells, and corruption utility skills. Plus we can’t forget the 1 second cast time on DS auto attack and slow travel of every single one of those projectiles as well.

Extended CD’s along with over 1 second cast times on many of our utilities is an annoyance that no other class faces to this extent.

Not sure i would say wells have long cast time with their 1/4 but the fail to activate in wvw is annoying like crazy.

But yeah overall necro’s is the slow attrition class with long cooldowns.

uhh look lots of condition cmonn epidemic almost there … you can do it … oops to late target is dead :<.

Oh look that guy has almost full health and tons of conditions here we go!! casting…casting..wait what just happend to all the conditions…whats that epidemic ? you didnt spread anything but felt like taking your break anyway! well i hate you tyvm.

The issue is the cast time plus animation imo (add lag and it’s worse). I play staff and a the animations seem to double (at least) the cast time overall. Add to that how bad staff 1 is, and it can be frustrating. Been trying to get some video of the delay between pressing the skill, the start of the animation and the cast time, and the time it actually happens.

Seems like the sequence is: press skill, pre-cast animation, casting time + casting animation, post-cast effect, skill happens. But, we seem to be balanced around cast time alone, which is why staff 1 is so horrible.

I play with greater marks, and always center the marks under my target. I will lead them if they are running, but with greater marks, unless they dodge, I have always hit my target. Since the patch, I am constantly having marks left on the ground even though they didn’t dodge and were well within the radius of the mark when it dropped.

Focus 5……wow.

I don’t think I’ve ever NOT had that skill dodged unless the person didn’t know I was there.

Press 5…..Painfully long telegraph visible from across the map…..POW (Dodge)

Bas.7406:

Focus skills have ridiculous cast times, so do signets, Minions, wells, and corruption utility skills. Plus we can’t forget the 1 second cast time on DS auto attack and slow travel of every single one of those projectiles as well.

Extended CD’s along with over 1 second cast times on many of our utilities is an annoyance that no other class faces to this extent.

I don’t have a problem with minion cast times, since the best they can do is interrupt the cast and delay me a few seconds (you can’t “miss” a summon), and if they are wasting all their interrupts to delay a minion summon by 3 seconds, yay me!

On the other hand, the second you step into any decently skilled PvP, the cast times just suck. I wouldn’t mind if we had longer cast times (btw, wells have 1/4 second cast time), but almost all our cast times of 3/4s or longer need a reduction of 1/4-1/2 of a second. There is no reason that Spinal Shivers should have a 1.25 second cast time, or that Epidemic/CPC have 1 second cast times (epidemic was fine pre-patch because it didn’t have so many ways to fail, but not now).

I have to agree, our cast times are just too ridiculous right now. I don’t mind it in PvE since mobs don’t avoid things, but in PvP it completely nullifies certain weapons (like focus) from having wider use.

Its also a problem thanks to interrupt. Longer cast times means longer interrupts.

A serious problem when we aren’t exactly a mobile class.

I use the dark armor trait in death magic. now im happy with our cast times. I think we take so long to csst our skills because if they land they are very punishing. for example a duel with a warrior. he pops his signet elite, we use spinal shivers. his elite was wasted and is now chilled leaving us free to poke at him with other abilities in relative safety.

I also think of dagger 2 as the ele water 2 (almost) equivalent. really helps to have some healing on ahigh dmg skill.

Bull Zooker.1672:

I use the dark armor trait in death magic. now im happy with our cast times. I think we take so long to csst our skills because if they land they are very punishing. for example a duel with a warrior. he pops his signet elite, we use spinal shivers. his elite was wasted and is now chilled leaving us free to poke at him with other abilities in relative safety.

I also think of dagger 2 as the ele water 2 (almost) equivalent. really helps to have some healing on ahigh dmg skill.

Dark armor only works with channel skills dagger #2 Axe #2 DS #4.

Our abilities are not nearly impactful enough to grant the long cast times. It wouldn’t be so bad if this were the case for every profession, but even comparatively we have pretty big cast times on a lot of the skills that matter (like Epidemic and Spinal Shivers).

I thought that was the case wiazabi ty for clarifying. still I cant see that our cast times are overly excessive. longer than most other classes? yes but this all fits into the necro play style, beat someone down over time shutting them down etc if we could put chill vulnerability weakness blind and bleeds etc etc on a target witth no cast times to slow that all down, we would be godlike. I like the feel the cast times bring. ‘wait for it… bam now ive got you’ goes through my head alot.

Bull Zooker.1672:

I thought that was the case wiazabi ty for clarifying. still I cant see that our cast times are overly excessive. longer than most other classes? yes but this all fits into the necro play style, beat someone down over time shutting them down etc if we could put chill vulnerability weakness blind and bleeds etc etc on a target witth no cast times to slow that all down, we would be godlike. I like the feel the cast times bring. ‘wait for it… bam now ive got you’ goes through my head alot.

I agree that instant casting certain skills would be pretty OP. I am not asking for instant cast, I am asking for 1/4 to 1/2 second reduction on casts. Also, keep in mind the GW2 Philosophy™ is to have long cast times on powerful skills.

I can think if a large number of skills that cast in 1/4 second that are very powerful (wells for instance) and then things like dagger 5, have longer cast times for no apparent reason. Is dagger 5 more deserving of that cast time than corruption boon, which is nearly instant? Would anyone argue that enfeebling blood is more powerful than corruption boon?

It is a matter of fluidity, as I have repeated over and over again, more than balance. To be FUN the cast times should be shorter. If balance issues develop, then adjust the skills back. Mesmer has the fun factor because of its mobility and short casts.

You know what isn’t fun? Fighting a hammer warrior… and failing to land enfeebling blood over and over and over again, along with so many other skills. They still die 99% of the time, but it isn’t fun sitting with my butt planted on the ground knowing that my only available options are going to take upwards of 3/4 of a second to cast.

Water combat cast times. That is all I would ask, and it would be more than I can imagine them ever giving us.

ok I guess that’s a fair point. u can get instant enfeebling blood on DS (I know thats not the point your making but would be a good choice against melee enemies if u struggle to land the weapon version) I know what you mean about your only options being on a long cool down when you need to escape or stall them so u can heal etc. as I find that very frustrating. but u can combat that by pre planning to an extent ie. flesh wurm is awesome. if we were given more mobility skills I fear I would never play anything else ;-)

I would be more than grateful to have our cast times cleaned up. In PvE it is irritating to miss epidemic among other things. In PvP the problem becomes painful. Hammer warriors perma interrupting, guardians to less of an extent. Thieves are only visible for 4 seconds tops giving you precious few options to land anything meaningful. Most obnoxious though is the inconsistency with our cast times. As mentioned dagger 5 isn’t some amazing end all nuke yet has a massive cast time attached, while other skills that are quite a lot better have less limiting activation times.

Bas.7406:

Ascii.9726:

Cast times are fine, its the travel times of skills that needs a buff. (Necrotic Grasp, Dark Path and Spectral Grasp) Most people can outrun the travel time with Swiftness and have the skill fizzle away.

Focus skills have ridiculous cast times, so do signets, Minions, wells, and corruption utility skills. Plus we can’t forget the 1 second cast time on DS auto attack and slow travel of every single one of those projectiles as well.

Extended CD’s along with over 1 second cast times on many of our utilities is an annoyance that no other class faces to this extent.

I don’t get it.

Focus Spinal Shivers is only 1.25 because its the longest chill we have, it removes 3 boons and has a medium base damage upping by 150% if it removes boons. Its also a non-targeting skill casting at 900-1200 range.

Minions do have a meh cast time, but noone uses them anyway.

Signets are also useless and the one that is slightly viable is insta-cast and breaks stun.

Wells are 0.25s and i don’t know about you but Well of Suffering being one of the highest hitting skills in the game on a 0.25s cast is pretty broken.

Corruption skills more specifically Blood is Power is only, not bad for 10 stacks of might and 2550 base bleed. Corrupt Boon is instant cast.

Life Blast at 50%+ LF is the strongest auto-attack in-game w/o elites. period. a 1s cast time is kind of needed when you can crit for 5k+ whilst taking no health damage. The projectile speed is OK, but unless they run out of range or dodge it will hit.

@Ascii -

Spinal shivers in tournaments at max damage hits for 1500. That’s ridiculous for the amount of time that channel takes. It’s easily interrupted, 3 boons is almost nothing, in fact a majority of players don’t even take focus and just pick up the spinal shivers instant at 25 percent health.

Minions there are still a few of us who use them just not in wvwvw.

Signet of Undeath is the most equipped utility in the game.

I like how you left Epidemic off Corruption skills ;P. It’s the most obvious culprit.

You must play WvWvW more than tournaments, Life Blast is great when you can hammer noobs who stand there and let you do it while not hitting you back. In tournaments, you jump into death shroud, the good teams swap and hit you to take it away. 1 second cast time while being hit = 3 casts at best before LF is out or your at 50 percent and need to jump out.

wiazabi.2549:

Dark armor only works with channel skills dagger #2 Axe #2 DS #4.

And the downed state channel.

I think that casting times are generally fine, but I agree it’d be nice if they were brought down a bit.

Epidemic would be nice, seeing as it’s now dodge-able.
Spinal Shivers is fine given the potency of its effects.
As a Terror necro, I’d like it if Staff #5 was lowered by 1/4 second.

After switching from my engineer, I feel like my necro is so slow.

Sure 3/4 and 1 sec cast time doesn’t look so bad. But it’s a lot longer then most other class.

I don’t feel like Focus #5 deserve a longer delay then any other skill?

It’s a single target attack, that does medium damage. Sure it does chill and remove boon, but staff #3 does chill and poison in a big AoE.

The dynamic fighting style of GW2 just feel weird with all those casting time.

@Bas

It seems to me you spam Shivers then rather then strip important boons such as Stability and Protection. As it was also pointed out by developers our class isn’t about crazy damage so a 1500 base + -3 boons + chill is a fairly decent tradeoff for 1.25s.

Minions are pure PvE. There not PvP material because of there terrible UI and easy nukability not because of cast times.

Signet of the Undead has exactly the same cast time as Battle Standard.

Epidemic in anything other then hot joins and PvE is a waste of a utility especially after the nurf and even still 1 second isn’t the end of the world considering what it does to pugs and the fact its a traited 12 second cooldown skill.

Life Blast may channel abit slow, but again its the strongest auto-attack in-game. Even landing one that crits is worth it. Saying its useless because you get focused is like saying Fear is useless because people spam Stability.

Ascii.9726:

@Bas

It seems to me you spam Shivers then rather then strip important boons such as Stability and Protection. As it was also pointed out by developers our class isn’t about crazy damage so a 1500 base + -3 boons + chill is a fairly decent tradeoff for 1.25s,

Except any semi decent player with stability and protection is going to interrupt your cast putting you on cd while they pummel you. Saving Focus 5 for stability means you would rarely cast it at all, which we don’t cast it much because of it’s ridiculously exaggerated animation and extended cast time, making focus essentially worthless in pvp. Corrupt boon is a better usage or the Well that swaps boons to conditions.

Ascii.9726:

Minions are pure PvE. There not PvP material because of there terrible UI and easy nukability not because of cast times.

They don’t have terrible ui, there is bad pathing period in the game that adversely affects minions. Their AI is easy simply and not at all complicated. Some players just can’t handle anything that requires them to not one button kill. The cast time issue I simply pointed out because it doesn’t make sense with the CD and how low their health is, I have no real issue with it, and I know quite a few players who use minions to great effect in tournaments. If you lose them all at once, it’s completely your fault. Bone Minions, flesh golem, and Flesh Wurm are becoming more and more common because of how strong their active is.

Ascii.9726:

Signet of the Undead has exactly the same cast time as Battle Standard.

Seriously? You are comparing a signet that does one good active with an elite skill that buffs your entire party, raises your entire party and can be used on the same CD as your signet, and calling that okay. Again all signets except Undead and Locust are awful, but I think you missed that part since I was saying EVERYONE BRINGS UNDEATH to tournaments. You said, no one brings them. I said everyone does.

Ascii.9726:

Epidemic in anything other then hot joins and PvE is a waste of a utility especially after the nurf and even still 1 second isn’t the end of the world considering what it does to pugs and the fact its a traited 12 second cooldown skill.

The fix of epidemic only effects world vs world vs world. It has no bearing on it’s usage in tournaments, and the fact that you believe it’s a waste of a utility reflects a lot more about your lack of experience in tournaments. There isn’t a single high level conditionmancer I have talked to who hasn’t said Epidemic and Signet of Undeath are mandatory for high level play due to how strong they are. The only change they made was LOS which has no effect on it’s usage in tournametns.

Ascii.9726:

Life Blast may channel abit slow, but again its the strongest auto-attack in-game. Even landing one that crits is worth it. Saying its useless because you get focused is like saying Fear is useless because people spam Stability.

It’s not even close to the strongest autoattack in the game. Dagger 1 auto attack chain alone can hit for 13k, Warrior GS Auto can hit for 3k easily, Warrior Axe Auto chain hits for over 9k, Warrior Mace Auto, Guardian GS, Guardian and Warrior hammer, I could go on, but you should really rephrase that to. DS is the only 900 ranged auto attack that hits that hard. Ranger LB auto hits harder as well ;p.

Epidemic is for Hot Join? What?

@Bas Beat me to it

Kardiamond.6952:

Epidemic is for Hot Join?

I almost laughed when I saw that, and then figured he must be a strict wvwvw player. The Epidemic change crushed it in wvwvw keep takes.

I still use Epidemic when roaming in WvW.

Having a group fight, and spreading mass condition on their entire team is a no brainer for me.

Kardiamond.6952:

I still use Epidemic when roaming in WvW.

Having a group fight, and spreading mass condition on their entire team is a no brainer for me.

I hate the skill because it’s too famous. Anyone that cares knows what the cast animation looks like and dodges it, or they’re a baddie and die before the cast ends. The amount of times I’ve landed a solid Epidemic and really impacted the course of a fight is balanced by the amount of times I’ve missed it, it got dodged, or I cast it on dead people and accomplished nothing. This might be a L2Play issue, but I prefer to run almost any other utility skill despite the fact that it’s very strong on a good team. This is coming from a mostly WvW, hotjoin, and PvE player though.

PinCushion.7390:

Kardiamond.6952:

I still use Epidemic when roaming in WvW.

Having a group fight, and spreading mass condition on their entire team is a no brainer for me.

I hate the skill because it’s too famous. Anyone that cares knows what the cast animation looks like and dodges it, or they’re a baddie and die before the cast ends. The amount of times I’ve landed a solid Epidemic and really impacted the course of a fight is balanced by the amount of times I’ve missed it, it got dodged, or I cast it on dead people and accomplished nothing. This might be a L2Play issue, but I prefer to run almost any other utility skill despite the fact that it’s very strong on a good team. This is coming from a mostly WvW, hotjoin, and PvE player though.

That was my point, the cast time combined with the fact it can be dodged and blocked, and the exaggerated animation annoy me. It’s an incredibly strong skill to land, and pretty dang important in tournaments, but good players see that animation and simply dodge or interrupt you.

Bas.7406:

The fix of epidemic only effects world vs world vs world. It has no bearing on it’s usage in tournaments, and the fact that you believe it’s a waste of a utility reflects a lot more about your lack of experience in tournaments. There isn’t a single high level conditionmancer I have talked to who hasn’t said Epidemic and Signet of Undeath are mandatory for high level play due to how strong they are. The only change they made was LOS which has no effect on it’s usage in tournametns.

Not the only change. That was just the change they chose to put into the patch notes. I am with Ascii on this one, in that epidemic is very much a -near- trash heap skill in non-pve, and even worse in tournaments, where immunities, vigor, block are incredibly common on all classes.

The unlisted change was the big slap to epidemic. Obstructed was the patch notes restriction now in place. What they didn’t put in, was that it can be dodged, blocked, blinded, fails on immune targets. In the Spvp environment, you are talking about a skill that was AT 100% on activation (never failed), to sub 50% if you are lucky. One of the amazing things about epidemic was that you did not have to worry about it being “avoided”, hence the long freaking cast time wasn’t as much of a problem. Now it has that long cast time, fails, and smart people have figured out how to avoid it entirely, just like focus 5.

The difference between a guaranteed aoe chill/poison/bleed, and a “maybe” chill/poison/bleed is very painful. I am still using it in WvW, because I still love it when it hits. But I can tell you for a fact, I am much less dangerous in WvW now.

LOS was an acceptable change, and here is hoping they will fix the rest of the LOS cheating skills that allow some classes to own siege, while others get to do nothing. Dragon Tooth as far as I know still circumvents LOS.

But for cying out loud, why hit the effectiveness of the skill in open terrain. It was a minor nerf placed with a hidden massive nerf.

Refer to my previous posts on this: Put it back the way it was, leave the LOS nerf in place, raise the cooldown if you think it is too strong.

I think the DS1 should be 3/4 or 1/2 cast time. We should be able to get more than 5 shots of with it with fury popped

• “Except any semi decent player with stability and protection is going to interrupt your cast putting you on cd while they pummel you.”

I refer you back to my " Saying its useless because you get focused is like saying Fear is useless because people spam Stability." statement. Any ‘decent’ player has the chance to counter others.

• “They don’t have terrible UI, there is bad pathing period in the game that adversely affects minions.”

They don’t engage even if in range, period. Heres one example

• “You are comparing a signet that does one good active with an elite skill that buffs your entire party, raises your entire party and can be used on the same CD as your signet, and calling that okay.”

Undead is not an elite skill… also they dont have the same CD they have the same Cast Times. Undead is 60 seconds quicker then banner.

• “It’s not even close to the strongest autoattack in the game. Dagger 1 auto attack chain alone can hit for 13k”

Check your statistics. bar elite skills, 50%+ DS-1 is the strongest auto attack in-game. Dagger 1 is a chain, 3 skills not 1. Ranger LB does not hit harder then DS-1

Ascii.9726:

• “Except any semi decent player with stability and protection is going to interrupt your cast putting you on cd while they pummel you.”

I refer you back to my " Saying its useless because you get focused is like saying Fear is useless because people spam Stability." statement. Any ‘decent’ player has the chance to counter others.

This was my point and the reason why our cast times are issues in tournaments. You are now just agreeing with me so I have a feeling you didn’t understand my original point, that it’s much easier to counter a necro out of his bigger attacks because of the exaggerated animation and cast times.

Ascii.9726:

• “They don’t have terrible UI, there is bad pathing period in the game that adversely affects minions.”

They don’t engage even if in range, period. Heres one example

That video shows a player who used aoe to force attacks and then chose never to use his actives to create action. This is creating a false reality. I also saw the minions attack after a few seconds, thought player never once used two single target attacks in a row so I am not sure what your point was. We have already stated that aoe skills create confusion and a delay in attacking. Two single target skills = minions attack.

Ascii.9726:

• “You are comparing a signet that does one good active with an elite skill that buffs your entire party, raises your entire party and can be used on the same CD as your signet, and calling that okay.”

Undead is not an elite skill… also they dont have the same CD they have the same Cast Times. Undead is 60 seconds quicker then banner.

No one takes the banner without the reduced banner trait – Signet of Rage is too good other wise. Other than that you were the one the compared undead to Battle I didn’t so your point was you made a mistake??

Ascii.9726:

• “It’s not even close to the strongest autoattack in the game. Dagger 1 auto attack chain alone can hit for 13k”

Check your statistics. bar elite skills, 50%+ DS-1 is the strongest auto attack in-game. Dagger 1 is a chain, 3 skills not 1. Ranger LB does not hit harder then DS-1

You said strongest auto and then disqualified a chain? That’s not a valid arguement then The Dagger chain is an auto attack. If you want to make the claim that DS is the strongest single ranged attack you would be wrong there as Lich Form auto hits harder. Trust me on this one LB hits harder and faster when traited than LB.

Would you rather hit for 3200 every 3/4 seconds with a quick travel time or would you like to hit 5k ever 1 second with a slow casting speed that can be dodged? If you answer 5k than you haven’t fought those BM rangers with unending vigor.

Ascii.9726:

50%+ DS-1 is the strongest auto attack in-game. Dagger 1 is a chain, 3 skills not 1. Ranger LB does not hit harder then DS-1

Not sure it matters that it is a chain really… wouldn’t a better way to look at it to be the damager per second that the skill puts out vs. other auto attack skills damage per second?

I would argue that chains are always better because of the added effects, such as vulnerability, boon stripping etc. Also blocks/blinds are less effective against chains.

I think what you meant to say here is that this is the strongest ranged auto attack. On that I would agree. Comparing it to any other 900 range #1 skill would show that in single hit or in damage per second. (not counting lich, its a transform)

That being said, I would be happy if they halved the damage, and doubled the fire rate. More bleed procs (makes sense with curses tree), and would be less punishing if you canceled a 80% casted bolt (or got interrupted). Also that would be awesome with unyielding blast and the reapers might proc. Prob would have to scales those back to 50% chance though.

I’m saying for the effect Spinal Shivers has on an enemy if it hits justifies the cast time. Its not the best cast time for the utility it provides, but Necros aren’t designed to be the best utility class.

Im not sure were your getting the “used aoe to force attacks” from, all i ever did was auto attack. The video shows minions not attacking a target I’m on despite being in range, skill activation has nothing to do with it. Rangers pets auto attack even out of the range of the master even without skills being used, Mesmer clones home in and stay aggroed no matter how far you run. I’m not sure what you referring to about AoEs as im auto attacking a boss and the bone fiend takes 12 seconds to engage and the shadow fiend doesn’t at all. This is bad UI, not bad pathing, the fact half the minions engage and half don’t shows this.

Traiting has nothing to do with this comparison, if you compare a traited banner then compare a traited undead. I compared cast times of Banner and Undead, both have similar effects of reviving, neither should be longer or shorter then the other.

A chain is multiple attacks… not a single hit. Using your “decent player” theory 3 attacks from a dagger has 3 opportunities to be interrupted. Also if you read my post properly you’ll see i said “bar elite skills” as in excluding elite skills.

As for what i would prefer, weaker and faster or stronger and slower, it has to be slower for the simple fact on countless occasions I’ve bypassed HP triggering traits (Elixir S, Endure Pain) by critting people for 5k+ from 40%-30% ) unfortunately were bordering on personal Necro preferences here so it has no bearing on the overall Cast Time discussion.

Rennoko.5731:

Not sure it matters that it is a chain really… wouldn’t a better way to look at it to be the damager per second that the skill puts out vs. other auto attack skills damage per second?

I suppose it would be fair to say under optional conditions Dagger full chain would dish out more damage a life blast.

When i compare damage of skills i don’t count on the if’s or maybe’s of a full chain hitting, i compare the DPH of one skill hitting vs. the other but thats just my style of calculating stuff.

It isn’t any harder to dodge a LF that takes 1 second to cast than it is to dodge daggers which hit multiple times per second. Besides that, no one is going to waste interrupts on a dagger chain, unless you are some interruption god, you aren’t going around interrupting attacks that go off in 1/4 of a second; interrupting a 1 second cast with a very obvious animation (or just dodging) is pretty easy. DPS is still the most common damage calculation, because it is assumed that you are going to be able to hit your skills. Then you can start talking about hitting reliably, which LB just can’t do as well as dagger chain.

Spinal Shivers just isn’t reliable enough to warrant its use, outside of certain builds where a dodge wasted on Shivers is worth it (like minion builds). In a high level PvP match, that 1 second wasted casting a skill that fails, and then the enemy having those 3 boons for their full duration as a result is just too big of a swing; sometimes you need that stability/protection/vigor etc. down.

Ascii.9726:

Rennoko.5731:

Not sure it matters that it is a chain really… wouldn’t a better way to look at it to be the damager per second that the skill puts out vs. other auto attack skills damage per second?

I suppose it would be fair to say under optional conditions Dagger full chain would dish out more damage a life blast.

When i compare damage of skills i don’t count on the if’s or maybe’s of a full chain hitting, i compare the DPH of one skill hitting vs. the other but thats just my style of calculating stuff.

This may be the case, but that isn’t what you said. You stated auto attack which is the number 1 skill. DPH is completely different and not the same thing. There is a huge difference between 100b per attack hit and it’s full damage attack.

Bhawb.7408:

It isn’t any harder to dodge a LF that takes 1 second to cast than it is to dodge daggers which hit multiple times per second. Besides that, no one is going to waste interrupts on a dagger chain, unless you are some interruption god, you aren’t going around interrupting attacks that go off in 1/4 of a second; interrupting a 1 second cast with a very obvious animation (or just dodging) is pretty easy.

Dagger auto attacks can be walked out off, 900 range homing > 130 range. Forcing a dodge or interrupt with a DS-1 is a good thing, you will be taking no direct damage and should be at a safe enough range to dis-engage any counter. Also a dagger full chain has the same overall cast time as a DS-1.

Bas.7406:

This may be the case, but that isn’t what you said. You stated auto attack which is the number 1 skill. DPH is completely different and not the same thing. There is a huge difference between 100b per attack hit and it’s full damage attack.

The difference is 35% between a full dagger chain (1s) and a life blast (1s). I also should of defined what i see as an auto attack better, because to be honest as a Necromancer we should be doing very little auto attacking compared to classes like Thiefs and getting back on track, the 1 second cast time on Life Blast is justified by the damage it does anything less would turn it into an overkill machine gun.

Though i should say I can see now an argument in why some of what you’ve pointed out should be revised (minion cast times especially, Spite and Locust Signets and possibly this 1.25s Spinal Shivers that’s being painted as the most predictable, interruptable skill in the game.)

" if we could put chill vulnerability weakness blind and bleeds etc etc on a target witth no cast times to slow that all down, we would be godlike. I"

Statements like these sound like every time I read an underpowered class forum. It draws the players that like to try to win on underdogs and it is a form of masochistic self delusion. The last time I heard things like this it was Merc in TOR. Then before this it was Shadow Warrior in WAR.

No, you would not be godlike with stronger debuffs because of blocks, invulnerability, and stability on other classes. This already negates a lot of debuffs, then evades, then condi removal. Debuffs just do not compare to boons that do not miss. At all. Debuffs by themselves do not kill anything even a 25 stack bleed. You will have to land something else with it like a CC. If Necros had stronger debuffs they would still be underneath top tiers like Ele.

Necro has a niche in antiboon play but it’s nowhere near the capabilities of an ele.

If we could be healed inside DS I think it would be fair and also go a long way to fix a lot of the weaknesses of this class. Then siphon needs to scale with heals. That only fixes one trait line but still…

Minion cast times are kind of whack to me since they also are utilities, sometimes you want to summon and KD or summon and explode and you’re waiting for cast time, then rendering, then AI engagement already…the moment will have usually passed or you’re dead 10 seconds ago in PVP.

wiazabi.2549:

Dark armor only works with channel skills dagger #2 Axe #2 DS #4.

If Dark Armor included casting times then that would be great. Our cast times would then be to our BENEFIT.

crazyace I agree 100%. I was looking at this for scepter condition builds as when you use any of your abilities including dagger off hand your casting almost 50% of the time. givingyou 400 toughness 50% of the time would be very beneficial

and otaking. with our corruption abilities and multiple slows and boon strips you think we couldn’t render all those boons useless? yes invulnerable is annoying but its only limited to CD’s and it isnt like they can go invulnerable for longer than 3-4secs.
maybe I do like being the underdog. but I rarely lose in a 1v1 fight in spvp and am a great asset to my team in tpvp. so that makes all the fancy invulnerability and blocks a wasted CD and satisfying for me if I can beat them without it.

given that ^^ the whole underdog talk means nothing. as im not the underdog in most encounters.