Guild Wars 2

I agree to most of these changes, even if some might be a bit overtuned they are good as ideas for what we generaly want and need.

I was doing some something somilar privatly, but I was theorycrafting with making wells similar to warriors banners, large AoE but nerfed damage and slightly nerfed effects. It would mean that in boss fights or capture points in PvP the wells are more powerful and hard to evade, but bursting people with them are no longer possible. It could solve some of the mobility problems of the necro if it would force enemies who would want to fight the necro stand in the wells, making them quite powerfull. But that is just some theorycrafting that many might not agree with.

I’m against outright filling in our gaps; every class should have and needs weaknesses/drawbacks. For example, I don’t think we should be given tons of mobility, but instead give us better ways to stand and fight (so more stability options, maybe a trait that adds 1 sec of stability when we use a spectral skill, or move the stability in DS trait to a diff. line so I don’t have to pick between that and 50% crit). Instead they should improve the things we already have, especially when it comes to our weapon skills.

Teevell.1684:

I’m against outright filling in our gaps; every class should have and needs weaknesses/drawbacks.

With the amount of drawbacks Necros has, we should have highest DPS in the game by a huge margain. Either we get that, or they have to fill in our gaps.

Arche.7326:

I agree to most of these changes, even if some might be a bit overtuned they are good as ideas for what we generaly want and need.

I was doing some something somilar privatly, but I was theorycrafting with making wells similar to warriors banners, large AoE but nerfed damage and slightly nerfed effects. It would mean that in boss fights or capture points in PvP the wells are more powerful and hard to evade, but bursting people with them are no longer possible. It could solve some of the mobility problems of the necro if it would force enemies who would want to fight the necro stand in the wells, making them quite powerfull. But that is just some theorycrafting that many might not agree with.

I believe the cool thing of wells is to have them “carve kitten in the ground where you die immediatly mwuahaha” kind of.
I do personally prefer versatility over raw power, which is why i like your opinion, but then they would have a big discrepancy with mesmer’s wells in general regards: low radius vs big radius, nerfed effects vs butt clench areas.
Instead, you should go for the immob route: Grant wells a low duration immob to have 1-2 ticks proc, while you calmly cast your dagger 3.

Let’s say that unyielding blast becomes baseline and the trait it replaces becomes: “Wells apply 1s of immob the first time they hit an enemy/when cast”.
Or apply that effect to spiteful spirit as it fits the trait line much better.

That may not help during boss fights, but then opponents must respect our wells even more…while being consistent with how wells generally work.

Teevell.1684:

I’m against outright filling in our gaps; every class should have and needs weaknesses/drawbacks. For example, I don’t think we should be given tons of mobility, but instead give us better ways to stand and fight (so more stability options, maybe a trait that adds 1 sec of stability when we use a spectral skill, or move the stability in DS trait to a diff. line so I don’t have to pick between that and 50% crit). Instead they should improve the things we already have, especially when it comes to our weapon skills.

I agree with you, that’s why i suggested to give shadowsteps to big cooldowns, such as signet of undeath which we never use and plague.
A tiny little of projectile block/reflect is required, necro’s the only profession that has zero, thieves for example have smoke screen and the elite spin, that’s very little but enough.

Also, that’s why i’m suggesting to make the debuffs of MoC much much harder to bear instead of reducing them.

If they want Reaper to be anywhere close to viable in WvW, we have to have a utility that gives us access to multiple stacks of stability on a reasonable cooldown.

My suggestion, remake the shout that creates jagged horrors (which is completely useless) into a shout that grants stabilty based on targets hit or something similar.

If it requires targets hit to give stability, it has to have a reasonable cooldown, like 60 seconds. Otherwise a longer cooldown but 100% of the stability stacks regardless of amount of targets hit.

Without reliable self stability, the Reaper will useless.

Thor Rising.7850:

If they want Reaper to be anywhere close to viable in WvW, we have to have a utility that gives us access to multiple stacks of stability on a reasonable cooldown.

My suggestion, remake the shout that creates jagged horrors (which is completely useless) into a shout that grants stabilty based on targets hit or something similar.

If it requires targets hit to give stability, it has to have a reasonable cooldown, like 60 seconds. Otherwise a longer cooldown but 100% of the stability stacks regardless of amount of targets hit.

Without reliable self stability, the Reaper will useless.

Shroud 3 will grant stability.
Plus the “same stability regardless of targets” goes against the mechanics of all other reaper shouts, so i’m afraid they wouldn’t do it.

These are good suggestions, and I have a lot of thoughts, but I’ll start discussion by talking about the Focus

The Focus has three problems.

(1) Cast times are too long. These are some of the longer casting times on any weapon in the game & the effects are weak.

Long cast times are one way you can give abilities that a class needs, but shouldn’t be using in Pvp. When anet eventually gives the necromancer a projectile block, I fully expect long cast times. But for core functions like boon removal & vulnerability, necromancers shouldn’t suffer long cast times.

(2). The focus hasn’t kept up with power creep.

Since the launch of the game, pretty much every other main weapon has been buffed to cleave or pierce. Vulnerability and boon generation have been handed out to everybody on every weapon like crazy.

Also the regeneration on focus 5 doesn’t even work in death shroud.

There are too many boons that pop up too fast for the removal of three boons on twenty seconds cooldown to mean anything. & if the necromancer is supposed to be some sort of a vulnerability generator, it needs to be able to survive in team fights..

Anet’ s power creep to the focus has been range increases. This doesn’t do much. Focus 4 needs to be cast at point blank melee range, and focus 5 is too slow to cast.

(3) Spinal Shivers does too much damage.

Or the trait that casts spinal shivers does. The focus skill is weak, but the trait is problematic.

All of the % damage proc hit traits in the spite line effectively mean that anet can never introduce a proper “finisher” for the necromancer. It’s why our biggest damaging skills hit for so little. Combined with spinal shivers we would be 75%-> 0, some of the squishy classes. We just saw our downed trait get nerfed down hard because of spinal shivers.

I’d like this to happen to focus.

Spinal Shivers. Becomes the #4 skill. Gets 33% less of everything. Less damage, less bonus damage, less boons removed 3-2 (or maybe even boons convert), less cast time less cooldown.

Say, .5 or ,75 cast, two boons, less bonus damage (or removed boons become conversions and no bonus damage), 12 second cooldown. Chill duration can stay the same.

Reaper’s Touch

Less cast time & faster removing projectile. If regeneration is not ever going to work in death shroud, then this should generate offensive boons like might and fury.

If paired with the changes to spinal shivers above, then it also should swap to skill #5, become a proper finisher, do more damage & have a longer cooldown.

ANet aren’t interested.

They ignore suggestion threads, whine threads and everything in between. They have their own balance agenda (as witnessed by the years in which necro is useless in PvE) and will make decisions without explanation or apparently sense (chilling darkness).

I’m not trying to kitten post here, or make you feel bad. It’s just that ANet have repeatedly demonstrated that they do not read these forums, that they do not care for our opinion, and that they will act without communicating with the community or taking on feedback.

At this point, if you’ve not realised that then there’s something deeply wrong.

That’s not to say discussing it with other players isn’t a fun distraction, but suggestions threads like this won’t change a thing. Time better spent working out if you can discover a meta build or something.

Cast times on Necro are very painful (3/4 s or more).
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/List_of_necromancer_skills

Can we please also get some better underwater elites. We have 1. Just 1. All of my minions can swim, but my flesh golem apparently drowns. Please teach my golem to swim.

SupahSpankeh.8452:

ANet aren’t interested.

They ignore suggestion threads, whine threads and everything in between. They have their own balance agenda (as witnessed by the years in which necro is useless in PvE) and will make decisions without explanation or apparently sense (chilling darkness).

I’m not trying to kitten post here, or make you feel bad. It’s just that ANet have repeatedly demonstrated that they do not read these forums, that they do not care for our opinion, and that they will act without communicating with the community or taking on feedback.

At this point, if you’ve not realised that then there’s something deeply wrong.

That’s not to say discussing it with other players isn’t a fun distraction, but suggestions threads like this won’t change a thing. Time better spent working out if you can discover a meta build or something.

Since release i’ve never seen a truly big discussion thread regarding the necros, while some threads like the kits hobo sacks discussion lived for 2 years.
It’s not a matter of them not caring, i believe they secretly check here from time to time, it’s about having a big enough discussion to actually propose these suggestions.

Also, necros’ subforum is often bloated with sadness and rant, much less than other professions overall, now imagine you’re one of the devs who decided to apply the chilling darkness nerf and have yourself insulted that badly from the community for a trait rarely anybody picked. It could be fixed in one/two weeks, with the next balance patch, yet many got personal.

I’d love to see much more synergy between the player base and the developers, i’d love to see them asking us opinions, especially on upcoming changes and i’d love the player base to successfully deliver those opinions in a civil way.
If we keep being pessimistic and ranting, we can’t except the devs to collaborate with us, if we do the first step then at least it’s not our fault and we might leave the developers more prone to collaborate. Plus it’s funny to do really, i like to come up with ideas.

ButterOfDeath.2873:

What the necromancer is missing

• Projectile reflects, blocks
• Mobility
• Forms of team support

The OP seems very sPvP/WvW oriented.

• Mobility :
  Flesh wurm, 25% signet, 25% traited dagger, spectral walk.

• Forms of team support :
  Vampiric aura, Wells, Life transfert, Blood is power (for might).

• Projectile reflects, blocks :
  Death shroud can absorb damages.

To me, if you want to buff the necromancer in a PvE and make it viable in a group, Arenanet has to tweak wells :

• Increase CD reduction from -20% to -33% on Vampiric Rituals.
  It will both boost up necromancer’s damage and team support.

• Well of power pulse stability and last longer.
  With a reduced CD (50-33% = 34 sec), this well should last at least 6 sec to be balanced with a traited guard (hallowed ground / master of consecration ).

You will be able to replace a guardian by a combo mesmer / necro as you’ll get enough stab via mantra + well, the mesmer can reflect via focus (trait) / feedback and the necro can sustain heal via life stealing.
Both can remove condi.

purecontact.1680:

ButterOfDeath.2873:

What the necromancer is missing

• Projectile reflects, blocks
• Mobility
• Forms of team support

The OP seems very sPvP/WvW oriented.

• Mobility :
  Flesh wurm, 25% signet, 25% traited dagger, spectral walk.

• Forms of team support :
  Vampiric aura, Wells, Life transfert, Blood is power (for might).

• Projectile reflects, blocks :
  Death shroud can absorb damages.

To me, if you want to buff the necromancer in a PvE and make it viable in a group, Arenanet has to tweak wells :

• Increase CD reduction from -20% to -33% on Vampiric Rituals.
  It will both boost up necromancer’s damage and team support.

• Well of power pulse stability and last longer.
  With a reduced CD (50-33% = 34 sec), this well should last at least 6 sec to be balanced with a traited guard (hallowed ground / master of consecration ).

Flesh wurm has a long cast time and can be killed.
Spectral walk doesn’t bring you out of danger in an immediate fashion.
Movement speed isn’t a problem, especially since the signet’s active is very neat too, we just need one little shadowstep/rush.

Vampiric aura’s support is actually very very low, the damage and heals given are incredibly bad, yet it’s kinda fitting so leave it i guess.
Life transfer is actually really good.
Blood is power is actually fine, it’s almost as good as 3 fire field blast finishers.
But aside that and some condi cleanse, we really don’t bring much at all! Compare those three traits/utilities with let’s say an elementalist sitting in water attunement doing dodges only, he’s already out-supporting us lol!

I agree with the vampiric rituals change, 33% seems much more fitting for a grandmaster.

purecontact.1680:

ButterOfDeath.2873:

What the necromancer is missing

• Projectile reflects, blocks
• Mobility
• Forms of team support

The OP seems very sPvP/WvW oriented.

• Mobility :
  Flesh wurm, 25% signet, 25% traited dagger, spectral walk.

• Forms of team support :
  Vampiric aura, Wells, Life transfert, Blood is power (for might).

• Projectile reflects, blocks :
  Death shroud can absorb damages.

To me, if you want to buff the necromancer in a PvE and make it viable in a group, Arenanet has to tweak wells :

• Increase CD reduction from -20% to -33% on Vampiric Rituals.
  It will both boost up necromancer’s damage and team support.

• Well of power pulse stability and last longer.
  With a reduced CD (50-33% = 34 sec), this well should last at least 6 sec to be balanced with a traited guard (hallowed ground / master of consecration ).

You will be able to replace a guardian by a combo mesmer / necro as you’ll get enough stab via mantra + well, the mesmer can reflect via focus (trait) / feedback and the necro can sustain heal via life stealing.
Both can remove condi.

ALL Balance changes are PvP oriented + PvE has computer preprogrammed mobs that are too easy atm.

The biggest thing Necros are missing is scaleable defense.

We need some type of activated short duration immunity.

Bias.4306:

The biggest thing Necros are missing is scaleable defense.

We need some type of activated short duration immunity.

Actually, if any changes such as those or mobility will be applied, i think signet of undeath should take the hit.
Nobody enjoys the active, the passive is barely decent, we could make it a 75s cooldown endure pain with a small 600 range blink bundled together.

From a PvE point of view, I think that if you’re able to return 2 whisps alone in swamp, you don’t lack of mobility.

Teleport is a defensive mecanic to avoid damage.
As a necromancer, you can switch into Death Shroud to take damage.
If you think teleport is an offensive mecanic then you can use Dark Path (15 sec CD).

Vampiric aura’s support is fine.
Look at virtue of resolve, it heals for 100hp every 3 sec.
Unless you use very slow weapons, Vampiric aura is better than virtue of resolve.

An elementalist sitting in water won’t do any dps.
Again, I focus on PvE as I think we don’t need a lot of things to be viable in a party.

Falcon.8713:

ALL Balance changes are PvP oriented + PvE has computer preprogrammed mobs that are too easy atm.

If you balance only for a PvP purpose, you’ll let some class behind in PvE.
How many of necromancers have been kick from a dungeon party or had to switch to an other class?

The balance I purpose won’t suddently make the necromancer overpowered in PvE or in PvP, it’s just little adjustement that won’t hurt a lot and let necro shine a little in dungeons / fractals.

There are so many threads about this stuff, and it has been this way for ages. I’m really doubting anything will change.

But, I’ll just dump this here. It’s basically what I’d write if I was to write another post about this same topic.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/necromancer/TO-DEV-TEAM-BUFFS-FOR-NECROS/first#post5263534

I think the finishers, projectile mitigation, buffs to allies and damage modifiers are something we need in PvE, but will also be very useful in other areas of the game.

Things such as the mobility and stability are more of a PvP thing that will really help with catching up, and not getting rekt by CC all the time.

Being able to do basic actions like ressing and stomping in Lich and Plague, and being able to exit and enter Death Shroud without interrupting stomps and resses are more of a quality of life change I think.

Considering what other classes do I don’t really think any of my suggestions are overpowered.

purecontact.1680:

From a PvE point of view, I think that if you’re able to return 2 whisps alone in swamp, you don’t lack of mobility.

Teleport is a defensive mecanic to avoid damage.
As a necromancer, you can switch into Death Shroud to take damage.
If you think teleport is an offensive mecanic then you can use Dark Path (15 sec CD).

Vampiric aura’s support is fine.
Look at virtue of resolve, it heals for 100hp every 3 sec.
Unless you use very slow weapons, Vampiric aura is better than virtue of resolve.

An elementalist sitting in water won’t do any dps.
Again, I focus on PvE as I think we don’t need a lot of things to be viable in a party.

Falcon.8713:

ALL Balance changes are PvP oriented + PvE has computer preprogrammed mobs that are too easy atm.

If you balance only for a PvP purpose, you’ll let some class behind in PvE.
How many of necromancers have been kick from a dungeon party or had to switch to an other class?

The balance I purpose won’t suddently make the necromancer overpowered in PvE or in PvP, it’s just little adjustement that won’t hurt a lot and let necro shine a little in dungeons / fractals.

An ele sitting in water hitting 1 once will deal more damage than quite a few seconds of vampiric aura, plus the ele can just swap to fire, provide fire fields, swap to earth, provide might and much more, while still dps’ing.
Then whenever needed, just swap to water, dodge if you have evasive arcana, and swap back to another attunement, you don’t need to stay in water at all.

Your suggestion regarding wells is very appreciated and wouldn’t even conflict with any other suggestion as nobody suggested a change to the vampiric wells trait, so what’s the problem?

While I agree with most of the changes, this is honestly a short list. You leave out a lot of traits that are problematic still (Terrifying Descent, Soul Comprehension), you leave out how important our finisher situation is, our lack of defensive mechanics that can be used to negate skills, the need for more anti-mobility, better LF generation on condition sets, signets working through DS as well as our traits/regen, minion AI and active skill fixes, and maybe some other things.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/3aghyy/graphics_necromancer_changes/

It’s already been discussed, I made a whole thread both on forums and on reddit with compilations of various changes by myself and others – in graphics and easiest-to-read fashion.
That would be it for my insight on things. Won’t link another 1000 suggestions, since they don’t seem to care or read it, but there you go!

Bhawb.7408:

While I agree with most of the changes, this is honestly a short list. You leave out a lot of traits that are problematic still (Terrifying Descent, Soul Comprehension), you leave out how important our finisher situation is, our lack of defensive mechanics that can be used to negate skills, the need for more anti-mobility, better LF generation on condition sets, signets working through DS as well as our traits/regen, minion AI and active skill fixes, and maybe some other things.

I did because i felt like the points i proposed are more compelling to me.
If you have more suggestions, please go ahead! I didn’t even have an issue with soul comprehension because i didn’t pay attention to it myself, but maybe you know a quality of life change that we may all benefit from knowing!

Sharing is caring! ;D

https://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/3aghyy/graphics_necromancer_changes/

It’s already been discussed, I made a whole thread both on forums and on reddit with compilations of various changes by myself and others – in graphics and easiest-to-read fashion.
That would be it for my insight on things. Won’t link another 1000 suggestions, since they don’t seem to care or read it, but there you go!

I love the feast of souls trait (when you gain LF, 30% of the amount is given as heal to allies nearby)
Many of those suggestions are golden, plus the effort of making all the images!
11/10 buddy! Ty for sharing them!

This is great! A lot of these are exactly what I thought Anet would implement in the future but just never happened.

Personally I’d like to suggest an Unholy Feast remake instead of a Spiteful Spirit remake. Unholy Feast is thematically unsuited for Axe because it’s a single-target ranged damage weapon but it has an ability that grants Retaliation, something more akin to a melee tank weapon. Also, it’s not a very useful ability in any game mode. If Unholy Feast could be buffed/remade there is no need to change Spiteful Spirit like the above posts suggests – basically killing two birds with one stone.

My personal suggestions for Unholy Feast:

• add a Blast Finisher
• drop the cast time to 3/4
• remove Retaliation component
• give Spiteful Spirit a flat 6-second Retaliation in addition to the current effect

My simple wishlist:

• Future shouts are blast finishers. Shouts are a simple mechanic that ignore placement. Being a blast finisher would give incentive to placement, grant party support, and stay in-theme. Bonus points since they have a cast-time anyway.
• Pulsing stability for foot in the grave. Engineers have a comparable GM trait that pulses both might and stability while flamethrower is equipped. Matches theme.
• At least a 3 second ICD for chilling darkness rather than 5, so that Well of Darkness is a least triggers twice. After Darkness is dropped initially, right now you can stroll through it with little worry.
• Access to utility bar in Shroud. If DS is going to be considered the active defense rather than blocks and blinks, I think it makes sense to not remove the limited options already available.

I think that if the main theme is to bring the foe down to your level and fight a sustained battle, that debuff’s are the way to go. Weakness right now feels like a poor condition to use. What I’d like to see is it changed to:

Weakness (caps at 10 stacks)
Your next attack deals 5% reduced damage and removes 1 stack of weakness.

Or

Add the effect where when applied it removes 1 stack of defiance and in the new system have it count as a condition that will affect the new defiance bar.

I think these changes would definitely be able to make necro’s have a unique niche in support.

ButterOfDeath.2873:

Greetings, after the recent changes and since anet stated they’ll release a balance patch every week or two, i’ve decided to start this thread to constructively talk about necromancer’s balance.
Here i’ll leave a few points i feel important regarding the current balance of the necromancer and a few of my suggestions to get the discussion going, i’ll try to keep the suggestions as close as possible to being made (such as changing stats instead of editing a behaviour) .

What the necromancer is missing

• Projectile reflects, blocks
• Mobility
• Reliable access to stability
• Forms of team support

Issues regarding weapon sets

• Axe damage feels underwhelming

• Focus is rarely used in any pvp scenario as warhorn and dagger are usually better

Issues regarding traits

• Spiteful spirit feels underwhelming, both due the ICD and the “meh” effect, it’ll never compete with the other two GMs as it is
• Lingering curse isn’t worth a GM
• Dhuumfire’s effect is not good enough, either make it apply two stacks or increase the duration by alot
• Of course, chilling darkness.

The necromancer has plenty of team support in the blood line now, and we don’t need mobility, blocks, or projectile reflects. Those are the guardian’s qualities. I’d honestly say the only thing we lack is reliable access to stability.

Axe doesn’t need damage, what it really needs is more identity. It seems like they’re making Axe a sort of support weapon that hinders the enemy, so I think they should expand on that. Some examples:

-change the axe auto attack into a psuedo-chain. Have one part of the chain apply vulnerability, and have another part of the chain apply weakness.
Rending Claws: Same as it currently is, shorter cast time (down to 3/4s cast time)
→
Ripping Claws: A moderate damage single slash that applies weakness (1/2s cast time)

-Alternatively, Make it so Ghastly Claws applies a burst of weakness at the end of the channel in a small AOE, with a ghostly green energy animation to indicate it.

-Focus is a great weapon paired with the Axe as they both have the mainstay of boon removal and applying vulnerability. If Axe is made better focus might be used more often as well. If Focus is really considered so weak, change spiteful talisman as that 5% when the enemy has no boons rarely applies.

Spiteful Talisman: reduce focus skill recharge by 20%, spinal shivers now corrupts boons.

-The ICD of spiteful spirits is only an issue if you run it without the unholy fervor trait, or if you take the speed of shadows trait. It’s obviously designed to be used with unholy fervor, which makes it so that it activates every time you enter DS. Spiteful spirit’s effect is also nothing to scoff at as it gives you AOE cripple, boon corruption, and plenty of retaliation.

xoularius.7204:

This is great! A lot of these are exactly what I thought Anet would implement in the future but just never happened.

Personally I’d like to suggest an Unholy Feast remake instead of a Spiteful Spirit remake. Unholy Feast is thematically unsuited for Axe because it’s a single-target ranged damage weapon but it has an ability that grants Retaliation, something more akin to a melee tank weapon. Also, it’s not a very useful ability in any game mode. If Unholy Feast could be buffed/remade there is no need to change Spiteful Spirit like the above posts suggests – basically killing two birds with one stone.

My personal suggestions for Unholy Feast:

• add a Blast Finisher
• drop the cast time to 3/4
• remove Retaliation component
• give Spiteful Spirit a flat 6-second Retaliation in addition to the current effect

Actually i kinda like the current axe as a tank weapon, especially with cleric gear.
axe 2 provides life force more reliably and quickly than dagger 1 chain (IMO), it has boon stripping and retail scales off power.

However i truly do agree with it being a blast finisher and the lowered casting time.

What if unholy feast prioritized might? That’d turn the boon strip into an actually fearsome tool. Fitting.

striker.3704:

The necromancer has plenty of team support in the blood line now, and we don’t need mobility, blocks, or projectile reflects. Those are the guardian’s qualities. I’d honestly say the only thing we lack is reliable access to stability.

Axe doesn’t need damage, what it really needs is more identity. It seems like they’re making Axe a sort of support weapon that hinders the enemy, so I think they should expand on that. Some examples:

-change the axe auto attack into a psuedo-chain. Have one part of the chain apply vulnerability, and have another part of the chain apply weakness.
Rending Claws: Same as it currently is, shorter cast time (down to 3/4s cast time)
->
Ripping Claws: A moderate damage single slash that applies weakness (1/2s cast time)

-Alternatively, Make it so Ghastly Claws applies a burst of weakness at the end of the channel in a small AOE, with a ghostly green energy animation to indicate it.

-Focus is a great weapon paired with the Axe as they both have the mainstay of boon removal and applying vulnerability. If Axe is made better focus might be used more often as well. If Focus is really considered so weak, change spiteful talisman as that 5% when the enemy has no boons rarely applies.

Spiteful Talisman: reduce focus skill recharge by 20%, spinal shivers now corrupts boons.

-The ICD of spiteful spirits is only an issue if you run it without the unholy fervor trait, or if you take the speed of shadows trait. It’s obviously designed to be used with unholy fervor, which makes it so that it activates every time you enter DS. Spiteful spirit’s effect is also nothing to scoff at as it gives you AOE cripple, boon corruption, and plenty of retaliation.

I mentioned projectiles block, not block in general, it would fit the necro! Just think of corrosive poison cloud, it makes sense that it would destroy projectiles.

Aside that, i love the spiteful talisman suggestion and the axe 1 chain idea feels good.

However i disagree with having an icd on spiteful spirits, it has an anti synergy with the recharge trait of shroud and even then shroud is 10s cooldown, popping it too early makes you wait 20s or more.

striker.3704:

The necromancer has plenty of team support in the blood line now, and we don’t need mobility, blocks, or projectile reflects. Those are the guardian’s qualities. I’d honestly say the only thing we lack is reliable access to stability.

I think this is a pretty important thing to consider.

I see a lot of suggestions that want to move us in the direction of what is basically another professions qualities. I know that currently the necromancer’s personally doesn’t really fit into the game too well. But I think it still can be solved without basically diluting the necromancers identity.

Regarding PvP I think the changes should be careful, as necromancers aren’t TOO far off. And it’s still a bit unclear how the new Reaper spec will handle in PvP for Necro.

Regarding PvE I think changes should be twofold.

First of all PvE itself has to undergo some changes. I really really hope that ANet designs it’s PvE content so that it requires more finesse. Necromancers are pretty sustainable and offer some sustainability to the rest of the group. On top of that we’re really good at buff/debuff management (stripping and corrupting opponents boons / transferring our party’s conditions / etc).
I think if ANet would play in on that a little bit more, make fights last longer and make mobs utilize buffs/debuffs more; that necromancer would find a spot much easier.
I don’t think any made suggestion (save for maybe a complete profession overhaul), is going to have enough effect if the dynamic of PvE content doesn’t undergo some sort of change.

Second of all, I think necromancer should offer more team support; but in a way that fits the necromancer style. Guild Wars 1 had some amazing good necromancer support that we can easily draw ideas from. The new Vampiric Aura is a step in the right direction, but it needs iteration.
Personally I would like to see easier accessible blast finishers for the necro, just 1 or 2 would do.

Last but not least. I think there are some general changes that need to happen.
Axe should get some more identity (something that is frequently mentioned in this topic and other topics). Initially it was suppose to the be the power direct damage weapon of choice, but we all know that dagger has taken that position.

You are making some valid points OP but reflects? Really?
Why does every class has to have reflects? I thinks it’s good the way it is. Necro’s have other pro’s that make up for that

I would even take warriors the abilty to reflect but yeah…. maybe i’m strange.

In general i think necro is very strong (i’m playing it in pvp lately). I Don’t know why everybody is upset about the profession. I think it’s very strong and easy to play.

Nyth.3492:

striker.3704:

The necromancer has plenty of team support in the blood line now, and we don’t need mobility, blocks, or projectile reflects. Those are the guardian’s qualities. I’d honestly say the only thing we lack is reliable access to stability.

I think this is a pretty important thing to consider.

I see a lot of suggestions that want to move us in the direction of what is basically another professions qualities. I know that currently the necromancer’s personally doesn’t really fit into the game too well. But I think it still can be solved without basically diluting the necromancers identity.

Regarding PvP I think the changes should be careful, as necromancers aren’t TOO far off. And it’s still a bit unclear how the new Reaper spec will handle in PvP for Necro.

Regarding PvE I think changes should be twofold.

First of all PvE itself has to undergo some changes. I really really hope that ANet designs it’s PvE content so that it requires more finesse. Necromancers are pretty sustainable and offer some sustainability to the rest of the group. On top of that we’re really good at buff/debuff management (stripping and corrupting opponents boons / transferring our party’s conditions / etc).
I think if ANet would play in on that a little bit more, make fights last longer and make mobs utilize buffs/debuffs more; that necromancer would find a spot much easier.
I don’t think any made suggestion (save for maybe a complete profession overhaul), is going to have enough effect if the dynamic of PvE content doesn’t undergo some sort of change.

Second of all, I think necromancer should offer more team support; but in a way that fits the necromancer style. Guild Wars 1 had some amazing good necromancer support that we can easily draw ideas from. The new Vampiric Aura is a step in the right direction, but it needs iteration.
Personally I would like to see easier accessible blast finishers for the necro, just 1 or 2 would do.

Last but not least. I think there are some general changes that need to happen.
Axe should get some more identity (something that is frequently mentioned in this topic and other topics). Initially it was suppose to the be the power direct damage weapon of choice, but we all know that dagger has taken that position.

Well, stability does fit the necro’s and reaper’s idea of unstoppable but slow force, projectile blocks fit the theme too, especially the corrosive poison cloud utility (literally it’s corrosive!), one/two long cooldown shadowsteps may fit due to necromancers dealing with shadows at least a little.

But aside that no might stacking/buffing auras/similiar ideas have been suggested, i feel like we’ve all stood true to necro’s theme.

Regarding axe’s identity, i’d either suggest a supporty or a hybrid role.
In the first case we might need something more than vulnerability, a cripple and one boon strip, while in the second case we could use some conditions.

The chain axe1 idea was cool, axe2 inflicting aoe vuln at the end seems cool and axe 3 isn’t that bad for the support role.

As for the hybrid role we just need to attach some poison/bleeding and we’re done pretty much. ofc IMO.

As some have said, each class should be different, so necromancer is not the mobility/support class. And I’m fine with that. So what are we: the scary powerful horror monster. So why the hell do we have the lowest DPS? Why do we have no stability (do you imagine the powerful horror monster slipping on a banana peal?)?

I think the problem is that somehow the developers think our death-shroud makes us so resilient we should not give much damage. But the problem we have is that this is mostly passive defense while we have nearly no damage negation. This game is much more about active defense than passive defense. So I am fine with us having less active defense “for the theme’s sake” but do not punish our DPS thinking our defense is “op”.

That is why reaper still have so little stability. I think it was meant to allow higher PvE DPS without making it too strong in PvP since it will get interrupted all the time. So this makes perfect sense but is based on the wrong idea that we’re already op in PvP.

I am a fairly new necro, so I don’t have the answer for everything but my few suggestions:
1) make life blast a 0.5 cast time. That’s the only way to balance the various DS-1 traits. This will automatically make dhuumfire stronger.
2) Stability should be part of the theme. I don’t want reflects, I don’t want active defense, I don’t want mobility but at least stability.
3) Without mobility, without group support, at least give necro high DPS. A necro entering death shroud should be feared (and not faked using DS-3 ). Staying on a well should mean assured death. And we should deal high condi-damage! We should not wait for the enemy to give us conditions for us to be able to wreck them with conditions!
4) I love the idea of the resistance for traited corruptions. Resistance fits so much the necro theme, I can’t understand why we don’t have it already.
5) Axe should be longer range (900 maybe) and slightly higher damage to fill the missing ranged-damage spot when reaper shroud comes.

purecontact.1680:

ButterOfDeath.2873:

What the necromancer is missing

• Projectile reflects, blocks
• Mobility
• Forms of team support

The OP seems very sPvP/WvW oriented.

snip

Funny because the biggest thing that holds necro back in PvE is lack of team support such as group projectile defence and other active defence on a more individual level. This has implications on necros self reliance defensively against dangerous bosses. Which results in a need for being carried. PvE has a heavy amount of projectiles. Not having blocks and extra active defence really limits you even in a group environment.

Group buffing isnt necros theme. Neither is mobility. We have plenty of debuffs. We just need debuffs to matter. Vuln is good. But improving encounters, to make control and other debuffs desirable, would be the ideal solution. As far as group buffing is concerned, if we just had reliable blast finishers we would be fine in that department without breaking the theme.

We need much more threat to compensate for the lack of mobility. One of the best ways to fix that is to just add more damage modifier traits. Unholy fervor should be a flat 10% damage on vuln foes regardless of weapon. Can also make vampiric aura give the current effect + 5% bonus damage to allies to make it much more desirable and still remain necro themed.

One of the biggest issues the necro has is the lack of finishers. This is primarily a PvE problem, But it also it effects other gametypes quite severely as well. We need our finishers to be less clunky and more reliable so we can help blast useful fields in groups. And we need them to work outside of combat. Self comboing is something many classes do in abundance yet we lack the possibilty to do this. A blast on axe 3 and/or warhorn 4 would go a long way to improve things. We could also do with lots of projectile finishers on things that make sense. Such as 100% projectile on staff auto and life blast. Projectile on deathly swarm, reaper’s touch and spectral grasp.

I honestly don’t mind at all how the necromancer plays and all, I would give up all theses changes in order to have a higher dps cause no matter what were at the bottom of the barrel dps wise. The other option could be sticking with this low dps and having more access to good utility

Sounds like most of these complaints are PvE oriented. Necros are one of the most wanted classes in WvW due to wells, and they still seem rather strong in PvP.

Tranquillity.8697:

I think it’s very strong and easy to play.

Even PvP wise we aren’t very strong, and as long as we are fighting on equal footing there is hardly any time where I can say that “I would have won” with the necromancer. There is always the “if they would have done this they would have won, but they kittened up”. In other words I have to outplay my opponent. Whenever I’m up against someone who is better or as good(or bad if you want) as me I tend to lose.

Interesting thread, with some interesting ideas. In the spirit of iteration and gradually balancing necro instead of trying to change everything and getting it hilariously wrong the first time (which would definitely happen if you tried to balance traits/utilities/weapons all at once), you should focus on updating one thing at a time and gradually building on the changes of each. As many have mentioned, necro lacks a couple things that I’d like to see improved: Team interaction (not necessarily even support, but interaction at all), Reliable scaling damage mitigation, and good sustain. Addressing each of these will be a multi-step process.

First round – Weapons
You’d want to balance weapons to feel good and perform well first, since they are core to the experience of the necromancer. Touching up weapons would likely look like this:

Dagger
P: Dagger #1 is the highest damage the necro has, which is odd since it’s an AA. Most other classes rely on cooldowns to get their highest damage. This makes the necro feel really boring to play in comparison (because every moment you aren’t auto attacking is a moment you’re lowering your DPS). By comparison, #2 is very lackluster (comparing only when you measure health differential) and thus only used really when closing a gap. #3 is a good mixture of utility and damage, and should be left alone.

S:: Slightly decrease the damage of the AA (very very slightly to bring it in line with other classes). Make the third attack steal health instead of dealing damage to fit the theme of the dagger as a siphon weapon. There are two S:s for how to deal with life siphon, both with pros and cons. One is to half the cast, and cut the damage by 25%. This keeps the damage over time relatively consistent with only a slight buff, and makes the skill feel better to cast. The second is to decrease the damage by 50%, and make the siphon AoE to give the dagger a better way to deal with larger groups of people in melee.

Axe
P: #1 and #2 are extremely similar, and neither of them really feels fun to use. It suffers from the same issue ranger longbow #1 and #2 did before the hilarious buff to rapid fire, but Axe was never touched. The third skill is good, but odd that it grants retaliation when you’re supposed to be in range with the axe and therefore being hit less.

S:: Move the life force generation to the auto attack of the axe, and increase damage on the axe AA slightly. Remove #2 and replace it with a new skill (not overly sure what you’d put in its place, but there are a lot more creative options than just to hit faster and do slightly more damage). Either that, or add an effect-per-hit to the #2 to give it at least a legit feeling to hitting faster. #3 is a shoe-in for a fast finisher, and it’s baffling that this hasn’t happened yet. This would be a buff to the spiteful spirit trait as well, giving necros a blast on shrouding which would be a neat combo.

Scepter
P: Scepter is an obvious condition weapon that hasn’t really kept up with condition creep. Warrior, ranger, mesmer, and engineer can all apply conditions better than you can as a necro with less investment in precisely the correct weapons and traits. In addition, it has the odd #3 skill that doesn’t benefit from condition damage at all – the stat you’ll be using if you’re going to equip the weapon. Compare the AA from scepter to the AA from mesmer staff, and you’ll notice the AA from staff on the mesmer does almost 50% more damage from conditions, and its AoE.

S:: Comparing it to other weapons, we can bring the condition damage on scepter slightly back up to where its been in the past. Increase the AA bleed from 5s to 8s. This makes up for the loss of condition duration from the spec rebalance, and brings it closer in line with other condition weapons. #2 is often used just to apply AoE bleeds, and is fine. Change #3 to have an actual condition effect that benefits from condition stacking (which is its current role). We could go two ways with this: you could either do something like removing a boon per condition on the enemy (which would require a cooldown re-balance) or you could apply conditions based on existing condition thresholds: something like “If your target has 2 or more conditions, apply poison. If your target has 3 or more conditions, apply torment. If your target has 4 or more conditions, apply confusion.” That really forces you to stack conditions then “unload” on an enemy to hurt them.

Staff
P: As others have mentioned, staff is an area control weapon that doesn’t really fit with any good role the necro has. It’s reasonable for everything, and is often used just because of its ranged AoE because we have no other long-ranged option. It suffers from the same problem DS does, which is that it’s trying to cater to both power and conditions, and thus caters to neither well. In addition, the AA is extremely lacking. Slow velocity projectiles at long range just dont work, because people dont rarely run in a straight line, and the damage/effect of the skill isn’t great enough to warrant the penalty of frequently missing your intended target.

S:: Increase the velocity of the AA ability. This is similar to things like ranger LB and Guardian scepter and engie grenades, which has all seen velocity improvements. Up the cast time to 1s, and add a condition to the AA (weakness? multiple vuln stacks?). Make every mark a blast finisher, but they only proc the finisher when they pop. This makes the blast potential very strong when you’re actively in combat, but makes them much harder to control since you must have an enemy IN YOUR FIELD to blast it, which fits with the necros theme of controlling an enemy. Increase the power damage from mark of blood slightly. Increase the power damage of chilblain slightly. Remove the poison field from Chilblains- there is no “over time” effect for Chilblains, so there is no point in leaving a field, and the poison field is very lackluster. Either that, or make the field pulse poison so the field makes sense. Putrid mark should remove a condition from nearby allies, but not transfer it. That nerf was unnecessary, especially given the strength of party condition removal added since then (such as martyr).

Focus
P: Cast time and boons. Spinal shivers is very powerful, and extremely easy to dodge. Reapers touch is an odd dichotomy. You dont ever really want it to hit your allies due to regen being underwhelming, and its function changes from defensive to offensive depending on whether you hit an ally or enemy.

S:: Tone down the power of Spinal Shivers and tone down the cast and cooldown to match. It would be nice to see the damage portion toned down (since that’s at best the secondary purpose of the skill, if not the tertiary) and then see the cooldown toned to something like 10 seconds. Change the boon applied by Reapers touch to be offensive (might stacks? Fury?) instead, so that it increases damage whether you hit an enemy or ally (similar to mesmer staff, for example). Make Reapers touch a projectile finisher.

Warhorn
P: Actually a really nicely balanced defensive weapon. Undervalued due to Wail of Doom not having a very noticeable effect in larger battles where warhorn shines. It’s an odd skill that you’ll only use on one person to interrupt a key skill, yet it’s AoE.

S:: Update Wail of Doom to have a more powerful effect on successful interrupt. Confusion or Torment would make warhorn see more play in condition sets, boon strip may be interesting for large group play.

OH Dagger
P: Nothing. It’s a solid OH used by every condition necro. Just touch it up to give it some finishers.

S:: Make deathly swarm a projectile finisher. Make enfeebling blood a blast finisher. This would also be a buff to curses Weakening Shroud

Once you have a good set of balanced weapons, then you can examine utilities and traits in light of the weapons. For example – are Spiteful Spirit and Weakening Shroud still underbalanced now that they have a blast finisher associated? Does Chill of Death need to change in light of focus changes? etc.

How about this:

Spectral wall converts all damaging projectiles passing through it to heal their target for a flat amount (perhaps 50hp?)

I think there are nice suggestions in this thread but maybe we should condense them in some way and make sure we agree on them. If an organized constructive feedback is given, it may be heard, contrary to 100 messages in a thread with people disagreeing.

Silverkey.2078:

I think there are nice suggestions in this thread but maybe we should condense them in some way and make sure we agree on them. If an organized constructive feedback is given, it may be heard, contrary to 100 messages in a thread with people disagreeing.

Unfortunately, a forum isn’t the best place to get this kind of a list, since people dont have a way to vote or show agreement on changes (in a way that would actually change the visibility of a post) :-/

There is also no way to float anything to the top unless the first person is reading the whole thread and editing their post.

People do agree on the underlying issues. The solutions do vary a fair bit. But as long as the devs fully understand the issues and have a range of solutions to take ideas from then they can come up with their own. Its the issues that need to be acknowledged. The suggested solutions are less important but they do help the designers.

People recognise that the core things necros are lacking are group support, mobility, active defence and damage. But the actual specifics of what those entail and how they should be approached differs from person to person. There certainly is agreement on general directions though.

For example everyone recognises mobility as an issue. Some say we should just get some actual mobility to fix this. Others think we should be compensated by other means to justify the lack of mobility.

Group support is a bit more of a broad subject because not everyone agrees on the type necro needs (typically any decent amount of one type would be probably be sufficient as long as it is not outclassed by other classes). But thats because its a broad role. Support can be group active defence, group buffing, the ability to interact with others group buffing (finishers), debuffing, control and unique utility.

Silverkey.2078:

1) make life blast a 0.5 cast time. That’s the only way to balance the various DS-1 traits. This will automatically make dhuumfire stronger.

Making life blast a 0.5s casting time ability would uberbuff power necro tho and dhuumfire risks being too powerful.
As i mentioned i’d prefer changing dhuumfire to give us plague blast.
Still 1/2 cast time, each hit transfers one condition and we lose the close range damage bonus. Useful for hybrid, useful for power(still a damage increase), useful for tanks (condi transfer) and useful for hybrid, while retaining the “king of conditions” and “controls opponents” theme. Also it’d become weaker against power professions as they don’t stack damaging conditions to us and it’d interact well with MoC.

AngelicLoki.1625:

-snip-

Golden suggestions, really thank you for chiming in.
Maybe a little too many finishers tho, blood mark shouldn’t bee a blast finisher imo.

Signet of Undeath: Signet Passive. Gain 1% Life Force whenever you use a skill while in combat. Signet Active. Strike nearby foes for very low damage. For 6 seconds, your Life Force will neither degenerate nor will it be reduced by damage. 60 second cooldown.

Bam. Active defense that uses shroud.

Rising Dusk.2408:

Signet of Undeath: Signet Passive. Gain 1% Life Force whenever you use a skill while in combat. Signet Active. Strike nearby foes for very low damage. For 6 seconds, your Life Force will neither degenerate nor will it be reduced by damage. 60 second cooldown.

Bam. Active defense that uses shroud.

I like that idea, but should it also maybe force you into DS like Unholy Sanctuary so you don’t lose a second of the invuln?

Rising Dusk.2408:

Signet of Undeath: Signet Passive. Gain 1% Life Force whenever you use a skill while in combat. Signet Active. Strike nearby foes for very low damage. For 6 seconds, your Life Force will neither degenerate nor will it be reduced by damage. 60 second cooldown.

Bam. Active defense that uses shroud.

I’m unsure about the active, it might be a little too strong (it’s the same as giving thieves more initiative, you gotta be careful with that), maybe a 1s ICD would make me feel more safe.

Aside that, the active is pure genius, the 60s cooldown can be compared with endure pain, however it lasts 2 seconds more and grants a good passive at the cost of requiring you to have shroud ready and at least 10% lf.
With transfusion i don’t feel like we’d ever need a revive utility anyway

I like this so much i’ll immediatly add it to the OP.

edit

No way, it’d exceed the character limit. I’ll add it to the reddit discussion tho!
(it’s third most popular atm!:D:D necro hype!)

cerulean moth.2743:

I like that idea, but should it also maybe force you into DS like Unholy Sanctuary so you don’t lose a second of the invuln?

Not a bad idea; I like it!

I think the most important thing to know about Necromancer changes we suggest is that if it doesn’t align with ANet’s theme for the Necromancer it’ll never happen. It took two forum specialists and some very long emails to ANet’s balance team to get things like the Blood Magic line revamp to happen.

I think the 6/23 patch helped us a lot, but they keep making… silly changes to the class without thinking about the ramifications. The 10% damage from Unholy Fervor used to be for any skill, now it’s just for axe skills… The Chilling Darkness ICD nerf, ugh. I wish I could just slap ANet’s balance team on the wrist every time they think of one of these really bad changes. It’s one step forward and two steps back much of the time, and that saddens me a great deal.

I was hoping for a mechanic to swap your health bar with your life force bar for the elite specialisation. Would give us pseudo active defence. Especially if you can get traits to cause the life force bar not to drain or to reflect projectiles for a few seconds when activitating the bar swap.

Krileon.8913:

Can we please also get some better underwater elites. We have 1. Just 1. All of my minions can swim, but my flesh golem apparently drowns. Please teach my golem to swim.

qol – but, This could use an update, even if the used a Skale or Skelk skin/animation(shadow or toxic of course).