Guild Wars 2

ODB.6891:

The philosophy of the OP is the reason so many mmos have failed. When you have options that are sub-par, you don’t nerf the ones that are not sub-par…you buff the ones that are sub-par.

No, because that will cause power creep and “gear check” content as opposed to “skill check” content.

Sorrow: “The issue is the lack of variety in healing skills just because CC is better in every situation over other heals (or WoB and BF are niche, see it as you want), not that CC is overpowered. I’ve never said that.”

Actually, your proposed solution was to nerf CC. You wanted to remove an aspect of it, and you have repeatedly said that aspect is too powerful. So yes, technically you didn’t say the words “nerf CC, it’s OP”, that’s what you’ve proposed.

The other two heals are niche by design, and I don’t see any way to strengthen them without making them OP under some circumstances. BF is for MM’s and people who want to level in a certain style. WoB is for those who want to support the team better and who either fight in a clump with their team or trait for ground-targeted wells.

Which answers the question you keep asking: when would you use the other two? Nerfing CC — excuse me, I mean “removing capability but we won’t call it a nerf” — won’t actually make the other two more attractive in the vast majority of use.

Even in a full minion build, I prefer all the day long Consume Conditions over Blood Fiend. Someone who is taking BF over Consume Conditions is just because he likes to have that little thing floating around and attacking sometimes for poor damage.

Same applies to WoB.
It makes no sense that you have to stack tons of healing power, 30 points into an useless traitline and 3 different traits to make a skill sometimes a better skill than consume condition. Not even worth the light field considering how much of them a guardian can spam.

The heals shouldn’t be niche and, in fact, they aren’t niche in most professions.
Let’s look at some other professions:
- Guardian: huge heal with passive effect – heal with block – huge heal with AoE heal. Where is the niche here?
- Elementalist: huge heal and condition cleanse with long casting time – good heal and extra boon – low heal and healing over time. Not seeing any niche there too.
- Warrior: huge heal – good heal and condition removal – low heal, low recharge and regeneration. No niche there too.
-Thief: huge heal, high recharge, condition removal and stealth – good heal, low recharge, evade and condition removal – meh heal, healing over time, low recharge. Probably the signet can be considered niche, but, still, not as niche as WoB or BF.
Do I have to go on?

sorrow.2364:

Even in a full minion build, I prefer all the day long Consume Conditions over Blood Fiend. Someone who is taking BF over Consume Conditions is just because he likes to have that little thing floating around and attacking sometimes for poor damage.

I’m going to maintain that full MM builds should prefer Blood Fiend in most circumstances. You have so much passive condi clear in that spec that you really don’t need more active clear than Staff 4 gives you and the extra attacker is still good for procing life siphon and boon stripping.

sorrow.2364:

Same applies to WoB.
It makes no sense that you have to stack tons of healing power, 30 points into an useless traitline and 3 different traits to make a skill sometimes a better skill than consume condition. Not even worth the light field considering how much of them a guardian can spam.

It’s a support heal. You take it when you want to support. Most professions don’t get the option of speccing support with their heal.

sorrow.2364:

The heals shouldn’t be niche and, in fact, they aren’t niche in most professions.
Let’s look at some other professions:
- Guardian: huge heal with passive effect – heal with block – huge heal with AoE heal. Where is the niche here?
- Elementalist: huge heal and condition cleanse with long casting time – good heal and extra boon – low heal and healing over time. Not seeing any niche there too.
- Warrior: huge heal – good heal and condition removal – low heal, low recharge and regeneration. No niche there too.
-Thief: huge heal, high recharge, condition removal and stealth – good heal, low recharge, evade and condition removal – meh heal, healing over time, low recharge. Probably the signet can be considered niche, but, still, not as niche as WoB or BF.
Do I have to go on?

Most of those heals are better or worse for different specs. Regardless, the Necro being able to specialize further with their heal than most professions is actually a strength, if the heals are all properly balanced for their niche.

Blaine Tog.8304:

I’m going to maintain that full MM builds should prefer Blood Fiend in most circumstances. You have so much passive condi clear in that spec that you really don’t need more active clear than Staff 4 gives you and the extra attacker is still good for procing life siphon and boon stripping.

Still, the healis it provides is still less. Also, your healing is floating around, exposed to be killed in any time. Are you sure to pick BF over CC?

Blaine Tog.8304:

It’s a support heal. You take it when you want to support. Most professions don’t get the option of speccing support with their heal.

It isn’t a support heal. It is just an heal that needs huge expenses in terms of traits and stats to be worth something. Healing Spring is a support heal.

Blaine Tog.8304:

Most of those heals are better or worse for different specs. Regardless, the Necro being able to specialize further with their heal than most professions is actually a strength, if the heals are all properly balanced for their niche.

Yes, if the heals are actually stronger when they are in their niche, which isn’t the case of Necromancers. Consume Conditions still gives better and more reliable heals compared to all the other skills, even when they are in their niche.

WoB and BF are pretty cool man, WoB does the most party healing and its useful for PvP and PvE, BF does DAMAGE! no other heal does that…. so no your wrong on all accounts from all viewpoints. I understand your entitled to your opinion but your still so wrong on so many levels.

Oh and devs read this stuff that’s why people are cheezed because topics like this bring nerfs i agree with tobby lets this post die (lol im just board ar work)

sorrow.2364:

- Guardian: huge heal with passive effect – heal with block – huge heal with AoE heal. Where is the niche here?
- Elementalist: huge heal and condition cleanse with long casting time – good heal and extra boon – low heal and healing over time. Not seeing any niche there too.
- Warrior: huge heal – good heal and condition removal – low heal, low recharge and regeneration. No niche there too.
-Thief: huge heal, high recharge, condition removal and stealth – good heal, low recharge, evade and condition removal – meh heal, healing over time, low recharge. Probably the signet can be considered niche, but, still, not as niche as WoB or BF.
Do I have to go on?

Let’s see…here. I’m just going with classes I know (so…not Thief or Ele)

Guardian: Healing Signet..this is their go to heal just like CC. The heal with a block is very niche because to get its full effect you’ll need Might on Block and AH (30 points in a tree) and really shines in the Dredge Fractal and WvW…but is outshined by the signet in most other places. Healing breeze is a group support heal…like Well of Blood.

Warrior: Healing Signet..hahahahahahaha…No. Just no. Regen is kinda meh..and the full heal is waaaay too small. Healing Surge…again the average heal and gives full adrenaline if you’re not at it. I’ve…never even slotted the other one, but my warrior is mostly PvE and dungeons.

Ranger: Healing Spring is the go to heal…and the strongest if you can sit in it. Also a water field. Troll Unget is good for taking constant damage..but terrible at burst healing. Heal as One…good for burst…but HS is still waaaay better.

Engineer: Probably the only class whose heals aren’t as niche. Elixir H is great for a HGH build…because that gives condition cleanse…and 3 stacks of might…and another boon. (Seriously….on a full elixir HGH build…you get 8 forms of condition removal. On a HGH Grenadier there are 6.) Healing Turret is great if you aren’t HGH but…suffers from AE. Med Kit is good for group healing…sorta…though I personally would use Healing Turret over it.

Mesmer: Ethereal Feast…is basically the only heal you’ll ever need. The Mantra heal is mostly used in a 30/30/0/0/10 build and just to increase damage…not to heal. The other…maybe in the Dredge Fractal for the reflect.

It looks to me that…Necromancer has some of the better balanced heals. I mean…even at my kitten range in WvW…I do have to think about which heal to bring with me (at least between Well and Consume).

sorrow.2364:

Still, the healis it provides is still less. Also, your healing is floating around, exposed to be killed in any time. Are you sure to pick BF over CC?

Yes, I’m sure, if I’m going MM and aren’t going to be fighting something like Lupi where it’s just going to die to AoE. I’m actually gonna try running with it on my condi build since I already have hella condi clear but would like the sustain to give me more uptime on spamming Scepter 1.

Which, again, isn’t to say that BF couldn’t use a buff. But that’s more a problem with minions in general.

sorrow.2364:

It isn’t a support heal. It is just an heal that needs huge expenses in terms of traits and stats to be worth something. Healing Spring is a support heal.

It heals teammates, so by definition it’s a support heal. Healing Spring is probably a bit better, but that’s more a symptom of Ranger heals being in trouble than anything else. However, it must be said that Well of Blood applies direct heals, not Regen stacks, so it’s actually better when your team already has a source of Regen (like, for example, Staff #2).

sorrow.2364:

Yes, if the heals are actually stronger when they are in their niche, which isn’t the case of Necromancers. Consume Conditions still gives better and more reliable heals compared to all the other skills, even when they are in their niche.

Which means the other heals likely need to be buffed. Not that CC needs to be nerfed.

tattoohead.3217:

WoB and BF are pretty cool man, WoB does the most party healing and its useful for PvP and PvE, BF does DAMAGE! no other heal does that…. so no your wrong on all accounts from all viewpoints. I understand your entitled to your opinion but your still so wrong on so many levels.

Oh and devs read this stuff that’s why people are cheezed because topics like this bring nerfs i agree with tobby lets this post die (lol im just board ar work)

Most party healing? Transfusion do better party healing than WoB.
BF does damage? ~300 damage every 2 seconds? Yep. But it can be killed anytime and your only healing skill is kittened.

I don’t know based on what you say that I’m wrong on many viewpoint, but it really looks quite arrogant from your side.

If people don’t agree with me it doesn’t mean I’m wrong.
People are wrong sometimes. Actually, they are wrong also quite often, especially when talking about balance.
Some example? Thief instagib build. Most people said “it is fine, l2p” but, yet, it was nerfed.
Another example? Hundred Blades. Most people complained at a time it was too strong, still, the skill is left untouched.
Another example? Terror+Burning. Most people here, actually some of them are also the same who are saying I’m wrong, said it is fine and people should learn to play. Yet, it will be nerfed the next patch.

I can keep digging into the GW2 forum past saying how many times people were wrong.
This assuming that what ArenaNet does is the right call, otherwise, it all goes up to a matter of opinion, which means it makes no sense you say I’m wrong.

Blaine Tog.8304:

Yes, I’m sure, if I’m going MM and aren’t going to be fighting something like Lupi where it’s just going to die to AoE. I’m actually gonna try running with it on my condi build since I already have hella condi clear but would like the sustain to give me more uptime on spamming Scepter 1.

Which, again, isn’t to say that BF couldn’t use a buff. But that’s more a problem with minions in general.

It still makes your heal exposed. Any enemy can just focus your floating heal and burst you down in any form of PvP.
In PvE, it just blows out from AoE, which makes that skill pretty much useless.

Blaine Tog.8304:

It heals teammates, so by definition it’s a support heal. Healing Spring is probably a bit better, but that’s more a symptom of Ranger heals being in trouble than anything else. However, it must be said that Well of Blood applies direct heals, not Regen stacks, so it’s actually better when your team already has a source of Regen (like, for example, Staff #2).

Yet, your teammates have to ball up in the well to get healed, which makes them more exposed to the AoEs. This completely overshadow the poor base heals WoB gives.

Blaine Tog.8304:

Which means the other heals likely need to be buffed. Not that CC needs to be nerfed.

Which is what I said multiple times. I proposed both the solution, but people tends to negate the issue if there is the possibility it can bring to a nerf.
The issue isn’t “CC should be nerfed”, the issue is “there is an imbalance through healing skills”.

I m really bored to read this thread…

People say it over an over…

Well of Blood gives great party healing especially if u stack HEALING POWER!!!!!!!
Nothing scales as good as this.
Why in the name of grenths farts do u keep comparing the healing of WoB with 0 HP against other traits/skills with 0 HP whens its the SCALING that makes it so good??

Take a look at this….
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fQAQBJCpBA-TIAgzCmA
923 healing power can make WoB heal your for up to 11373 and your allies for up to 5210

sorrow.2364:

Yet, your teammates have to ball up in the well to get healed, which makes them more exposed to the AoEs. This completely overshadow the poor base heals WoB gives.

Does the above number seem like “poor base heals”? also how about u play just a bit smart and not cast WoB right in the middle of the AoE?

sorrow.2364:

The issue isn’t “CC should be nerfed”, the issue is “there is an imbalance through healing skills”.

Then it seems we can all say the same thing… fix the healing capabilities of necro in general (as u proposed in the original post and as others said since the game was released)… leave CC as it is…(as everyone in this thread is saying)… agreed?

If you look at consume condition in a vacuum then yeah, it does look like its much more powerful then the other healing skills. However, you have to think about how it impacts the game for the profession it is on. Consume condition would be absolutely broken on something like a Guardian or mesmer. But its not on one of them, its on the profession with the worst self defense in the game.

Calling for nerfs on something that helps the necromancer take more hits when they pretty much have no choice but to take the brunt of nearly every attack would be just as bad as removing steal on a thief or removing aegis from a guardian. Necromancers don’t have stealth, blocks, counters, invulnerability, reflect or easy access to stability and Vigor. Every other profession does. The necromancer is the odd man out on this and there condition control and there death shroud is there only way to defend themselves. And it hasn’t been enough for them for the longest time.

Often times the necromancer will have to pop Consume condition with only 1-3 conditions on them. Which means that Mending, Either Renewal, Healing Spring, Hide in Shadows, and Withdraw all pretty much do the same thing without the long cast time not only that, these other heals do far more. Providing stealth, having 10 second shorter recharge, an evasion, having a higher base heal. Hell, Healing Spring heals conditions on allies each second and is a combo water field. That is huge. Not only that those professions have multiple ways of preventing themselves from taking damage, thus avoiding conditions all together.

And you say that it’s the best heal the necromancer has to offer? Wrong again. Well of blood is also a solid option providing support to allies and a far better option when building a more tanky build. Its bonus of providing a combo field gives further options where Consume condition does not. I have used both skills and I have to say, that both provide for good options to the necromancer.

Necromancer has a large health pool. A large health pool means that they have a natural resistance to Condition damage as is considering that condition damage is not effected by armor but is slowed when the one suffering has more health. The necromancer is designed to be able to win fights of attrition. Compared to there over all health pool, this heal has a low base heal. It isn’t going to put them back into the game if they face a foe who doesn’t apply conditions. And there are situations(which I have been in multiple times) when 1.25 seconds is way too long a cast time to save me from dying from condition damage. I’ve had to pop Death shroud just to prevent myself from dying.

If you can’t figure out how to use another healing skill in your build, then the problem is with you not having the ability to understand the profession. Not the skill itself. Every profession has a default heal that is usually the best for most builds. Consume condition just so happens to be the necromancer’s common heal. That doesn’t make it OP.

Enferian.2705:

I m really bored to read this thread…

People say it over an over…

Well of Blood gives great party healing especially if u stack HEALING POWER!!!!!!!
Nothing scales as good as this.
Why in the name of grenths farts do u keep comparing the healing of WoB with 0 HP against other traits/skills with 0 HP whens its the SCALING that makes it so good??

Take a look at this….
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fQAQBJCpBA-TIAgzCmA
923 healing power can make WoB heal your for up to 11373 and your allies for up to 5210

Why on this world shouls someone bring 923 healing power just to have a single skill to be good? Nothing on Necromancer scales properly with healing power.
It isn’t even that good, since to get a reasonable heal you have to stand into the well for the whole duration.
Transfusion is more reliable as party healing and doesn’t even needs you to stack 923 healing power to be worth something.

Enferian.2705:

Does the above number seem like “poor base heals”? also how about u play just a bit smart and not cast WoB right in the middle of the AoE?

Yes, the base heal is poor. Base heal = no healing power.
So, in 10s no enemy is casting AoE skills in which at least two people are balled up?
It doesn’t sound possible even for any braindead AI.

Enferian.2705:

Then it seems we can all say the same thing… fix the healing capabilities of necro in general (as u proposed in the original post and as others said since the game was released)… leave CC as it is…(as everyone in this thread is saying)… agreed?

In the same post, you said “WoB is good” and “buff WoB”. Are you just doing all this to avoid a remotely possible nerf or you are just incoherent?

sorrow.2364:

tattoohead.3217:

WoB and BF are pretty cool man, WoB does the most party healing and its useful for PvP and PvE, BF does DAMAGE! no other heal does that…. so no your wrong on all accounts from all viewpoints. I understand your entitled to your opinion but your still so wrong on so many levels.

Oh and devs read this stuff that’s why people are cheezed because topics like this bring nerfs i agree with tobby lets this post die (lol im just board ar work)

Most party healing? Transfusion do better party healing than WoB.
BF does damage? ~300 damage every 2 seconds? Yep. But it can be killed anytime and your only healing skill is kittened.

I don’t know based on what you say that I’m wrong on many viewpoint, but it really looks quite arrogant from your side.

If people don’t agree with me it doesn’t mean I’m wrong.
People are wrong sometimes. Actually, they are wrong also quite often, especially when talking about balance.
Some example? Thief instagib build. Most people said “it is fine, l2p” but, yet, it was nerfed.
Another example? Hundred Blades. Most people complained at a time it was too strong, still, the skill is left untouched.
Another example? Terror+Burning. Most people here, actually some of them are also the same who are saying I’m wrong, said it is fine and people should learn to play. Yet, it will be nerfed the next patch.

I can keep digging into the GW2 forum past saying how many times people were wrong.
This assuming that what ArenaNet does is the right call, otherwise, it all goes up to a matter of opinion, which means it makes no sense you say I’m wrong.

Blaine Tog.8304:

Yes, I’m sure, if I’m going MM and aren’t going to be fighting something like Lupi where it’s just going to die to AoE. I’m actually gonna try running with it on my condi build since I already have hella condi clear but would like the sustain to give me more uptime on spamming Scepter 1.

Which, again, isn’t to say that BF couldn’t use a buff. But that’s more a problem with minions in general.

It still makes your heal exposed. Any enemy can just focus your floating heal and burst you down in any form of PvP.
In PvE, it just blows out from AoE, which makes that skill pretty much useless.

Blaine Tog.8304:

It heals teammates, so by definition it’s a support heal. Healing Spring is probably a bit better, but that’s more a symptom of Ranger heals being in trouble than anything else. However, it must be said that Well of Blood applies direct heals, not Regen stacks, so it’s actually better when your team already has a source of Regen (like, for example, Staff #2).

Yet, your teammates have to ball up in the well to get healed, which makes them more exposed to the AoEs. This completely overshadow the poor base heals WoB gives.

Blaine Tog.8304:

Which means the other heals likely need to be buffed. Not that CC needs to be nerfed.

Which is what I said multiple times. I proposed both the solution, but people tends to negate the issue if there is the possibility it can bring to a nerf.
The issue isn’t “CC should be nerfed”, the issue is “there is an imbalance through healing skills”.

hmm i wish i didnt bite but here goes….

WoB i challenge you to find a #6 skill that does more party healing than WoB, maybe healing spring and HS is a water field but still that’s the only one i can think of. Yes transfusion does decent group healing and eles have great group healing but WoB is one of the best if not the best #6 skill for aoe heals.

Blood Fiends damage adds up in a MM build and the constant healing does quite a bit over time, im PvE this is a great skill

necros are the most powerful and diverse healers out there (with our #6) so that why i say your wrong and its not really a matter of opinion… and yes im arrogant but its well deserved

sorrow.2364:

I’m pretty sure I’ll be eaten alive by some people who read only the title and start anything to defend the skill.

In my opinion, this skill is that strong to the point it overshadows both the other heals.
Even if you run a full minion or well builds, picking Blood Fiend or Well of Blood over Consume Conditions is an huge loss over healing capability and condition removals, despite the fact that both WoB and BF aren’t bad skills.

I don’t think that it should be nerfed and forgotten; Necromancers needs that heal.
I think that part of its functionality and heal should be spread among other trait and utilities.

So, my solution is the following:
What do you think?

I think your premise may be somewhat flawed. Consume Conditions is an excellent heal, no doubt. However, the other heals (should) serve a good purpose. Well of Blood is a very good aoe heal and combo field and works well when group healing is important and condi removal isn’t top priority.

Blood Fiend…well, Blood Fiend just stinks. He stinks for primarily because if he dies (and you don’t pop him), you get no healing and your heal goes on cooldown.

If I were to make a suggestion, I’d suggest:
1) augment one of the Blood Magic traits to let Well of Blood to also remove one condition from everyone of effect in the area upon cast.

2) Increase the base toughness of Blood Fiend, and, if Blood Fiend is killed, have him heal you for 50%-60% of the base heal of Taste of Death.

I think the problem here is that the other heals suck, not that CC is too strong. CC is where heals should be. Anyone who uses WoB or the minion are really not doing their teams any favors. The only time I’ll concede that WoB is any good is when you’re totally teched into wells, but even then there are much better builds for the necro than that in all formats.

So I thought I’d find out how much you can get well of blood to heal for, just from the initial heal and ticks, not counting runes that activate on heal or siphon traits etc.

The answer is 61,383.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fQAQNAoYWjQad6haaa87JAJFAAw0DAAAAIFAAAA-jEyAoNioRqBYWsIasV3ioxqmJiqVNYWcioaXCmQAfHDA-w

The self heal is 18,131.

You need 25 might stacks for that, without it the numbers are 60,404/17,900.

I’m sure there are other buffs you could use, and you could raise it a bit by dropping 5 spite for 5 death magic, or ditching your 6th rune for a 25 healing power one. Still, that’s kind of good. Your damage would suck, but 3k attack and 2750 armor isn’t terrible, and dagger has high base damage.

I take fiend in a MM build it has other benefits. These include constant damage and health gain, you can explode it for a heal and a AoE poison with traits it also recharges fast with traits. Its nice with Lyssa runes random I admit but its a bonus as it will trigger on creation and killing it, because a MM build is probably using lyssa runes anyway you can clear conditions with golem.

Well of blood…. I used to use it in full bunker well builds and would chain my wells into near prema protection yes you have to invest traits into it. With the heavy condition meta its not as viable anymore, but when thiefs were running around insta killing folks it really did the trick.

Overall consume conditions is better then the other two heals. However both those other two heals can fit into specific builds giving them the edge imo in those builds.

Mammoth.1975:

So I thought I’d find out how much you can get well of blood to heal for, just from the initial heal and ticks, not counting runes that activate on heal or siphon traits etc.

The answer is 61,383.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fQAQNAoYWjQad6haaa87JAJFAAw0DAAAAIFAAAA-jEyAoNioRqBYWsIasV3ioxqmJiqVNYWcioaXCmQAfHDA-w

The self heal is 18,131.

You need 25 might stacks for that, without it the numbers are 60,404/17,900.

I’m sure there are other buffs you could use, and you could raise it a bit by dropping 5 spite for 5 death magic, or ditching your 6th rune for a 25 healing power one. Still, that’s kind of good. Your damage would suck, but 3k attack and 2750 armor isn’t terrible, and dagger has high base damage.

It isn’t by putting up exaggerate examples that you can prove a point.
Most the cases, your teammate is getting just two ticks before he needs to move out of the well due to AoEs.

sorrow.2364:

Why on this world shouls someone bring 923 healing power just to have a single skill to be good? Nothing on Necromancer scales properly with healing power.

This is why i say they need to fixthe overall healing capabilities of a necro.. to give us more things that scale with healing power

sorrow.2364:

Enferian.2705:

Then it seems we can all say the same thing… fix the healing capabilities of necro in general (as u proposed in the original post and as others said since the game was released)… leave CC as it is…(as everyone in this thread is saying)… agreed?

In the same post, you said “WoB is good” and “buff WoB”. Are you just doing all this to avoid a remotely possible nerf or you are just incoherent?

Where in the holy mother of Dhuum’s fire did i say “buff WoB”?
read the bold part again… by “by healing capabilies” i mean other ways to gain health like the ones u proposed in your first post (i m writing it again to make sure u get it)… are u incoherent or am i writing in japanese?

sorrow.2364:

So, in 10s no enemy is casting AoE skills in which at least two people are balled up?
It doesn’t sound possible even for any braindead AI.

Fortunately there is plenty of braindead AI in this game…
And also even if there is AoE u can see the healing from well as damage mitigation in some cases when the AoE would be unaboidable anyway.
Also when AoE is coming dodge out… then move in… u lost 2-3 ticks out of 10. Not all AoE is persistent for various seconds.

If u are arguing about the effectiveness of the heal in pvp things can change since people are not (usually) brainded and will AoE in the well… and even then there are cases when u can cast it on a point to help your bunker with some extra healing.

sorrow.2364:

Transfusion is more reliable as party healing and doesn’t even needs you to stack 923 healing power to be worth something.

If u want party healing whats stoping you from getting transfusion and the well, therefore getting even more healing?

sorrow.2364:

Mammoth.1975:

So I thought I’d find out how much you can get well of blood to heal for, just from the initial heal and ticks, not counting runes that activate on heal or siphon traits etc.

The answer is 61,383.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fQAQNAoYWjQad6haaa87JAJFAAw0DAAAAIFAAAA-jEyAoNioRqBYWsIasV3ioxqmJiqVNYWcioaXCmQAfHDA-w

The self heal is 18,131.

You need 25 might stacks for that, without it the numbers are 60,404/17,900.

I’m sure there are other buffs you could use, and you could raise it a bit by dropping 5 spite for 5 death magic, or ditching your 6th rune for a 25 healing power one. Still, that’s kind of good. Your damage would suck, but 3k attack and 2750 armor isn’t terrible, and dagger has high base damage.

It isn’t by putting up exaggerate examples that you can prove a point.
Most the cases, your teammate is getting just two ticks before he needs to move out of the well due to AoEs.

I don’t know about wvw, but that’s definitely not the case in tourneys. The effect is usually the opposite in tournaments, as your team starts getting healed for a thousand per second, you tend to push the other team off the point. Nonetheless, even if everyone can only stand in it for two seconds in wvw, that’s still ~22k healing.

+1 to let this thread die. The OP has been given numerous points of view which he clearly doesn’t want to hear. At this point, he’s just trolling.

Nothing to see here….please move along.

Enferian.2705:

Fortunately there is plenty of braindead AI in this game…
And also even if there is AoE u can see the healing from well as damage mitigation in some cases when the AoE would be unaboidable anyway.
Also when AoE is coming dodge out… then move in… u lost 2-3 ticks out of 10. Not all AoE is persistent for various seconds.

If u are arguing about the effectiveness of the heal in pvp things can change since people are not (usually) brainded and will AoE in the well… and even then there are cases when u can cast it on a point to help your bunker with some extra healing.

Absolutely no.
AoE damage in this game is far more higher than the heals WoB gives, even when you have the max healing power you can. That means that balling up to get some form of healing is overall a bad idea because your team will just blow up in a second.
Even if just two people are balling up is still an horrible idea, because you expose two people to damage instead of just one.

Even if the AI is brainded, it stills attack a single target with its AoE skills. If two people (or even more) are balled up to get the heals from the well, if one of them is targeted by the AI, two people get the damage instead of two which isn’t exactly a good thing. Never.

Healing Spring and water fields are a way better healing skills because people don’t need to ball up to get the healing. They just needs to either leap finishing or blast finishing into it to get a good amount of healing without having to stand in the well for 3 seconds.

Enferian.2705:

If u want party healing whats stoping you from getting transfusion and the well, therefore getting even more healing?

Because transfusion heals way more when dealing damage and doesn’t force your team to stand in an obvious well.
Also, the fact that Bloodthrist is on the same tier of transfusion.

Mammoth.1975:

I don’t know about wvw, but that’s definitely not the case in tourneys. The effect is usually the opposite in tournaments, as your team starts getting healed for a thousand per second, you tend to push the other team off the point. Nonetheless, even if everyone can only stand in it for two seconds in wvw, that’s still ~22k healing.

I guess why I never saw a single well of blood used in tournaments.
Even in the actual Necromancer meta, everyone is running Consume Conditions.

I guess it is because if multiple people are standing in a well to get healed, then multiple people are eating granades of an Engi, shatter of a mesmer, AoE from Elementalists, epidemic and AoE bleeds from a necromancer (just a single mark of blood is enough to make the well healing useless) and so on…

Even if you run shaman, the healing won’t be enough to compensate the fact that your team is balling up in a well.

Actually, I beat plenty of good teams with well of blood, although I wouldn’t run it in this meta. Transfusion heals for much less than a well of blood too. You should stop pretending as though someone who intends to bring party heals is going to bring zero healing power.

Does CC heal allies? NO

Can CC buff allies? NO

Does CC heal for more than WoB? Only if you have specced as a full damage dealer and even then it depends on the circumstances (if you’ve specced into being a healer it’s not even a contest, WoB always outheals CC by a mile)

Come back when CC can heal and buff allies, then you can claim it’s better. Until then, things are simple: CC is for damage dealers, WoB for healers and BF for Minion Masters (or it would be for minion masters if minion masters didn’t suck in absolutely everything).

Necromancer’s offensive capabilities need a nerf, but his defensive ones need a buff.
Nerfing Consume Conditions would move Necro even closer to the all-or-nothing style.

I think that the problem is that the other two heals have issues.
Well of Blood is insanely powerful with Healing Power.
Go test it in the mists sometime, it’s crazy!

But without healing power it’s pretty lame.
I think that it needs a higher base amount of healing and a lower bonus from Healing Power to make up for it.

Blood Fiend actually heals for quite a bit, but it’s too unreliable.
Someone kills it? Well, no heal for you!
It’s already pretty tough but I’d like to see it get even more extra health, possibly at the cost of lowering it’s damage.

And for whatever reason the Blood Fiend doesn’t generate it’s own health outside of combat, so if it got heavily damaged you pretty much need to consume it to have it for the next battle.
It’s short cooldown is very nice, though.

Mammoth.1975:

Actually, I beat plenty of good teams with well of blood, although I wouldn’t run it in this meta. Transfusion heals for much less than a well of blood too. You should stop pretending as though someone who intends to bring party heals is going to bring zero healing power.

Why in this world a Necro would spec in party healing and bring healing power?
Just a couple of skills scale with healing power and most of them have stupid low healing.

If you want to spec into party healing just reroll a guardian and heal 3x better while surviving more.

PMilkos.9103:

Does CC heal allies? NO

Can CC buff allies? NO

Does CC heal for more than WoB? Only if you have specced as a full damage dealer and even then it depends on the circumstances (if you’ve specced into being a healer it’s not even a contest, WoB always outheals CC by a mile)

Come back when CC can heal and buff allies, then you can claim it’s better. Until then, things are simple: CC is for damage dealers, WoB for healers and BF for Minion Masters (or it would be for minion masters if minion masters didn’t suck in absolutely everything).

Does WoB buff allies? No. You need a trait to buff allies with WoB, which is in the same tier of Greater Marks. Also, you don’t need WoB to buff allies. Other wells buff allies as well.

Does CC heal for more than WoB? YES. Always.
With 1000 healing power, CC base healing is 6.240, which is the same of WoB, with a conditional healing of 824. WoB healing is 552 per second.
The max extra healing for WoB is 6072.
The max extra healing for CC is 9888.
CC heals you istantly. With WoB you need to stand in the well for the whole duration to get the extra healing.
CC removes all the conditions. WoB doesn’t.
CC doesn’t require you to ball up in an obvious healing well animation to get significant healing.

Do you want to play as healer? Roll a guardian. Necro is a terrible healer also with 1.5k of HP.
Otherwise, bring transfusion and CC, which is always a better healing skill. You don’t even need to stack loads of healing power to do significant healing.

sorrow.2364:

Does CC heal for more than WoB? YES. Always.
With 1000 healing power, CC base healing is 6.240, which is the same of WoB, with a conditional healing of 824. WoB healing is 552 per second.
The max extra healing for WoB is 6072.
The max extra healing for CC is 9888.

Well of Blood with 1000 healing power:
5240 base + 1.0 efficiency * 1000 healing power =
6240 (you got this right)

Well of Blood pulses:
152 + 0.4 *1000 = 552 per pulse * 10 pulses (you forgot this, I think? Or you are giving weird numbers instead of totals.) = 5520

6420 + 5520 = 11940.

If there are 5 friendlies in your well (unlikely, I know) that’s 11940 *5 = 59700 Health healed.

The reason people don’t really use it much is that Necromancer doesn’t have many skills that scale well with healing Power.

If CC outshines the other heals, I feel that Blood Fiend and Well of Blood should be buffed rather than nerfing Consume Condition.

Just a wild idea:
WoB – buff its healing per pulse and should give 3% Life Force per pulse only to the necro that casted it.

BF – Blood Fiend should also be able to life steal and regenerate its health per attack; also slightly increase the health transfer; and when casting Taste of Death, Necro will gain Aegis and Regeneration.

LastDay.3524:

Well of Blood pulses:
152 + 0.4 *1000 = 552 per pulse * 10 pulses (you forgot this, I think? Or you are giving weird numbers instead of totals.) = 5520

Actually, I didnt, my numbers are right.

The max extra healing for WoB is 6072.

WoB ticks 11 times. One when casted and 1 time per second.

The reason a necro would spec into party healing is because we do it better than a guardian, not the other way round. Anyway, I’m done with you, you talk about standing in a well of blood for longer than 2 seconds like it’s christmasland then compare it to CC with a dozen conditions. You compare transfusion to well of blood as though someone with party healing traits and skills would have no healing power, and a bunch of other worthless crap. What a waste of time.

Like I told you already, I ran well of blood in competitive games. In fact, there were not many other necros in the top 100 at the time, and 2 of us were running well of blood. If necro bunker becomes played, which looks like a reasonable possibility, expect to see more well of blood.

Mammoth.1975:

The reason a necro would spec into party healing is because we do it better than a guardian, not the other way round. Anyway, I’m done with you, you talk about standing in a well of blood for longer than 2 seconds like it’s christmasland then compare it to CC with a dozen conditions. You compare transfusion to well of blood as though someone with party healing traits would have no healing power, and a bunch of other worthless crap. What a waste of time.

I compared the maximum healing potential of both skills, understood?

Standing in WoB in more than one people for longer than 2 seconds is possible, but then you are subject to the AoE, cleave and everything cast on your teammates making the extra healing you get completely useless. Is it hard to understand?

I compare WoB to transfusion because once you get Healing Power, transfusion heals pretty much the same as you have no healing power at all. Taking 1k+ healing power means having less damage, less condition damage or whatever you want. You are killing your damage just to make a kittening single skill on 40s cooldown working properly.
And don’t say that you are supposed to give up on your damage if you want to play as support. The only “support” skill you are listing is WoB. Other support skills work as good without any healing power at all.

If you are entitled that much with your opinion, then start using WoB with your super-duper 1.2k healing power build and let’s see how long you can last without switching back to CC or rerolling guardian.

sorrow.2364:

LastDay.3524:

Well of Blood pulses:
152 + 0.4 *1000 = 552 per pulse * 10 pulses (you forgot this, I think? Or you are giving weird numbers instead of totals.) = 5520

Actually, I didnt, my numbers are right.

The max extra healing for WoB is 6072.

WoB ticks 11 times. One when casted and 1 time per second.

So you gave out the very optimal amount of extra healing instead of the total number in a normal situation.
I don’t see why, but okay.
I wasn’t quite sure about 11 or 10 ticks so I’ll take your word on that.

I’d argue that standing in the Well of Blood for the full duration is very likely whereas having more than 3 conditions on you is very unlikely.
Unless you are playing sPvP and fighting a Necromancer, that is.

I’m still of the opinion that it’s just not used as much because you want Well Cooldown reduction and lots of Healing Power for it to be useful.
In PvE most run Zerker, Rabid, Rampager or something like that.

Terror Necromancers are overpowered in sPvP atm due to their ridiculous amount of Conditions.
This leads into Consume Conditions being extremely useful there right now.
Even many Elementalists have switched to using Ether Renewal in sPvP just to fight it.
Does that mean Ether Renewal is OP? No.

I don’t think that Consume Conditions being extremely good against one overpowered build really warrants any kind of nerfs to it.

Well of Blood could be buffed by either making it less dependent on Healing Power or simply by making Life Siphons so good that you actually want Healing Power for multiple reasons.

Necro healing is mediocre atm but could become pretty good, if they keep tweaking our other options. The thing with CC is that it is also our most reliable condition remove, which adds an additional layer of usefulness to it.
If they keep on improving minions and vampiric stuff in general(hpow scaling, i am looking at) and more people try minion heavy builds, they will find out how good traited blood fiend is. Atm it is our best sustained healing option BUT, like WoB, it gets kitten by our class mechanic and needs a heavy investment in traits.
Also it is a ranged minion(meaning less likely to die in AoE cleave) and decently sturdy. With traited minion hp it sits somewhere between 15-20k health (don’t know the exact number, someone tested it some time ago with the grenth statues in orr).

For Well of Blood, i think it is abyssmal. People look akittens scaling and think it is a great party healing tool but completely ignore how much it gimps you.
Well of Blood is only usable with cleric/shaman: The base heal is at 152 healing per sec on a skill that heals for 5,2k every 40secs. People think its great if you get healing power, but look at the numbers and compare them to other classes.
Without points in healing power:
Engi can heal his party for 2,5k every 15 seconds with healing turret burst. He also cures 2 condis with it and applies 5 seconds regen. No one has to stand around for 10 seconds to get some mediocre heal and the time needed is below 3 secs.
Eles with 15 points in water: cure 1 condi, heal 1302(healing ripple) water trident 1500 heal every 20 seconds. No healing skill involved, time to do it: below 3 seconds.
Guardian staff Orb of light and Empower healing for 788 +1500=2288 +10 stacks might every 20 seconds. Time required ~3 seconds.
This is only a hint at what other classes are capable off without completely sacrificing damage and using cleric. A fully healing specced ele/guard/engi can do even more.
Likewise a necro can do more, since we got gimpy DI and transfusion but what i wanted to showcase was: the Group healing you can get from WoB can be achieved 10 times easier by other classes without cleric gear!
Also every other class doesn’t require their team to clump up and stand on a spot for 10 seconds.

I can’t even fathom where this trash heal (WoB) would be good. In high lvl PvE you get slaughtered by standing in the same spot for 10 seconds. In high lvl WvW (where i got no exp) i am seeing tightly packed raiding parties marching through pug-zergs. They don’t stop, they smash their way through ‘em. In tpvp you get slaughtered for not using CC, because of a lack of reliable condi remove. Also you get cc’ed out of your own wells or killed by the AoE on top of it. Not worth it at all.

Some rnd suggestion: reduce base cd to 35 seconds. Triple the healing per tick but reduce number of ticks to 3 and make it a water field that also removes a condition per tick.

Bellamy.9860:

I can’t even fathom where this trash heal (WoB) would be good. In high lvl PvE you get slaughtered by standing in the same spot for 10 seconds. In high lvl WvW (where i got no exp) i am seeing tightly packed raiding parties marching through pug-zergs. They don’t stop, they smash their way through ‘em. In tpvp you get slaughtered for not using CC, because of a lack of reliable condi remove. Also you get cc’ed out of your own wells or killed by the AoE on top of it. Not worth it at all.

Some rnd suggestion: reduce base cd to 35 seconds. Triple the healing per tick but reduce number of ticks to 3 and make it a water field that also removes a condition per tick.

Standing in it for the full duration isn’t usually all that hard in PvE if you have dodges left.
Still, I think that it’s a leftover from when Death Shroud didn’t block healing.
A Necromancer at low health could cast Well of Blood and enter Death Shroud pretty much anywhere!
Not so now.

Anyway I agree with what you are saying:
It’s not Consume Conditions being overpowered, it’s our other heals being underpowered.
With that said there ARE professions with even worse heals.
Warriors for example… but I think theirs are getting buffed from what I’ve read.

Consume Conditions is fine.

LastDay.3524:

Standing in it for the full duration isn’t usually all that hard in PvE if you have dodges left.
Still, I think that it’s a leftover from when Death Shroud didn’t block healing.
A Necromancer at low health could cast Well of Blood and enter Death Shroud pretty much anywhere!
Not so now.

“If you have dodges left” ofcourse you can play around it but isn’t it sad, how you have to trait for 20 blood magic, invest heavily in healing power and use up your dodges just to make an extremely flawed skill work?
Also fractals and the whole agonic mechanic just work so hard against staying in one spot.
On the other hand there are some rare encounters, where you have to stay in a spot, where skills like WoB are a nice addition (AR bossfight) but there are so few of them and shorter application of the healing wouldn’t really hurt.

And yes, if DS would allow for healing the skill would be somewhat better. Blood fiend suffers from the same problem.

dude consume cond. is fine…rather the other two heals shud be buffed if they are outshined by cc rather than it being nerfed

First of all you’re not building just around one healing skill when taking WoB or BF. When you trait for well usage you’re going to be using other wells in addition to WoB. Wells become very good when fully or partially traited whether you’re power, condition or support Necro. When you trait for Minions you’re going to be using mostly minion skills. Secondly why is it bad that a healing skill like WoB need some investment to become better or useful? How is this different from a powermancer making power skills more potent or a conditionmancer making bleed skills better? You can’t just ignore that fact that WoB traited is very powerful. Again for each profession there is a universal heal and then there are specialty/niche heals that get much better with traits/investment.

I have a fully ascended Apothecary set and a fully ascended Rabid Set. I have played both in all aspects of the game. There is little comparison between the self/group survivability and attrition of my Apothecary Well/Epidemic build vs. my Rabid build or vs. other class support when it comes to heavy condition fights, while still doing good dps with area bleeds etc.

If we’re going to compare WoB to the healing abilities that other classes have, you have to include other Necro group heals in the argument. Other than WoB, we only have access to two real group heals:

Transfusion, which does scale off healing power ((292 + (Healing Power x 0.06)) x 9 (Edit: Tested again and still just 292 as i originally thought no matter what Wiki says about heal scaling. So no scaling) for 2628 group healing with a 40 second recharge.

Then there is MoB, which is overlooked by most, but very powerful over time.

If traited, Mark of Blood has 1200 range, a 4.8 seconds recharge, applies 3 stacks of 8 second bleeds along with 6 to 6 1/2 seconds of area regeneration, that “explodes” on allies/enemies in and around a 240 radius. So lets compare MoB’s straight up healing over time compared to other classes’ group spike heal skills:

Over 5 seconds: 650 health per ally with no healing power. 1505 health with 301 regeneration ticks (1364 healing power).
Over 10 seconds: 1300 health no healing power. 3010 health with 1364 healing power.
Over 20 seconds: 2600 health no healing power. Ele’s Geyser heals 808 x3 over 2 seconds for 2424 base healing +1320 area group heal per blast finisher. With 1364 healing power MoB heals 6020 health over the same time frame, while Geyser heals 3447 with 1593 finishers.
Over 30 seconds: 3900 health with no healing power. 9030 health with 1364 healing power.
Over 40 seconds: 5200 health with no healing power. Healing Rain needs to apply two blast finishers to keep up. Empower can’t keep up, even with lots of healing power. MoB heals 12040 health with 1364 healing power. Healing Rain needs four and a half blast finishers at 1364 healing power to keep up.

This shows that MoB and Transfusion can reliably fill in the gaps between WoB on par with other profession’s heals and at any range. Transfusion can also be swapped out for other good healing traits like MoE (more bleed stacks), Ritual of Life (second WoB) or Bloodthirst (more self heal from all your wells). If you look at Cleansing burst, Healing Breeze and Healing Spring (the only other AoE Heal Slot skills), Well of Blood traited surpasses all of them except Healing Spring arguably, because Healing Spring can be blast or leaped finished many times over the 15 second water field.

Edit: Support build for reference.
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fQAQNAW7YjQad6Zaub07JApHPj91TP+ecxjKMMA-jUCBINJDxRQmWQZm8IQ5RFRjtaqIas6ZER1qbYGxFRrWKAIWDA-w

sorrow.2364:

I’m pretty sure I’ll be eaten alive by some people who read only the title and start anything to defend the skill.

In my opinion, this skill is that strong to the point it overshadows both the other heals.
Even if you run a full minion or well builds, picking Blood Fiend or Well of Blood over Consume Conditions is an huge loss over healing capability and condition removals, despite the fact that both WoB and BF are underpowered compared to skills like consume conditions.
blood fiend can be easily nuked by the slightest amount of AoE, and well of blood doesn’t clear conditions at all, so it’s obvious why consume conditions is a better choice.

fix’d it for you.

Balekai.6083:

First of all you’re not building just around one healing skill when taking WoB or BF. When you trait for well usage you’re going to be using other wells in addition to WoB. Wells become very good when fully or partially traited whether you’re power, condition or support Necro. When you trait for Minions you’re going to be using mostly minion skills. Secondly why is it bad that a healing skill like WoB need some investment to become better or useful? How is this different from a powermancer making power skills more potent or a conditionmancer making bleed skills better? You can’t just ignore that fact that WoB traited is very powerful. Again for each profession there is a universal heal and then there are specialty/niche heals that get much better with traits/investment.

I have a fully ascended Apothecary set and a fully ascended Rabid Set. I have played both in all aspects of the game. There is little comparison between the self/group survivability and attrition of my Apothecary Well/Epidemic build vs. my Rabid build or vs. other class support when it comes to heavy condition fights, while still doing good dps with area bleeds etc.

If we’re going to compare WoB to the healing abilities that other classes have, you have to include other Necro group heals in the argument. Other than WoB, we only have access to two real group heals:

Transfusion, which does scale off healing power ((292 + (Healing Power x 0.06)) x 9 (Edit: Tested again and still just 292 as i originally thought no matter what Wiki says about heal scaling. So no scaling) for 2628 group healing with a 40 second recharge.

Then there is MoB, which is overlooked by most, but very powerful over time.

If traited, Mark of Blood has 1200 range, a 4.8 seconds recharge, applies 3 stacks of 8 second bleeds along with 6 to 6 1/2 seconds of area regeneration, that “explodes” on allies/enemies in and around a 240 radius. So lets compare MoB’s straight up healing over time compared to other classes’ group spike heal skills:

Over 5 seconds: 650 health per ally with no healing power. 1505 health with 301 regeneration ticks (1364 healing power).
Over 10 seconds: 1300 health no healing power. 3010 health with 1364 healing power.
Over 20 seconds: 2600 health no healing power. Ele’s Geyser heals 808 x3 over 2 seconds for 2424 base healing +1320 area group heal per blast finisher. With 1364 healing power MoB heals 6020 health over the same time frame, while Geyser heals 3447 with 1593 finishers.
Over 30 seconds: 3900 health with no healing power. 9030 health with 1364 healing power.
Over 40 seconds: 5200 health with no healing power. Healing Rain needs to apply two blast finishers to keep up. Empower can’t keep up, even with lots of healing power. MoB heals 12040 health with 1364 healing power. Healing Rain needs four and a half blast finishers at 1364 healing power to keep up.

This shows that MoB and Transfusion can reliably fill in the gaps between WoB on par with other profession’s heals and at any range. Transfusion can also be swapped out for other good healing traits like MoE (more bleed stacks), Ritual of Life (second WoB) or Bloodthirst (more self heal from all your wells). If you look at Cleansing burst, Healing Breeze and Healing Spring (the only other AoE Heal Slot skills), Well of Blood traited surpasses all of them except Healing Spring arguably, because Healing Spring can be blast or leaped finished many times over the 15 second water field.

Edit: Support build for reference.
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fQAQNAW7YjQad6Zaub07JApHPj91TP+ecxjKMMA-jUCBINJDxRQmWQZm8IQ5RFRjtaqIas6ZER1qbYGxFRrWKAIWDA-w

It’s like Necromancers are the only profession who is capable to mantain permanently Regeneration on allies.

An Arcana elementalist is capable to mantain Might, Regen, Swiftness and Protection on the team just by dancing through attunements. Also, with just 5 points into water magic, an elementalist grants extra healing over time via Soothing Mist. Not to mention the loads of Water Fields they have.

Guardians have a Virtue of Resolve that, when traited, grants its passive effect to the whole team. Also, a guardian, just by dodge-rolling, heals nearby allies for about 1.1k in PvE and 600 in PvP with about 1k healing power at no internal cooldown. Also, about 1k is healed once aegis is removed, when traited.

Mesmer can apply perma-regeneration on allies automatically through http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Phantasmal_Healing

Healing Turret of an engineer is capable to better apply regeneration over time.

sorrow.2364:

Copenhagen.7015:

All 3 heals have their place. Consume Conditions is just the best for most Necros. Blood Fiend is only usable with full Minion builds, and WoB is the best choice for bunker Necro. WoB is also a great choice for PvE.

This isn’t exactly true.
As I’ve said, both Minion Necros and bunker Necros will choose Consume Conditions over WoB and BF any day because how strong it is.

Then you have no idea what you are doing period. Blood fiend is hp generation giant. In general pve with few to no condtions or their utter irrelevance something that generates twice as much hp is worse? You ever actually used it before doing the “from the toilet seat theory”?
WoB is plenty useful in wvw and dungeons depending on what you are running and what specifically you need. Why would I care about condition removal when I got ele spam cleansing and a guardian doing the same thing? You also need a safety blanket at night too? Ppl stuck stacking in dungeons like their life depends on it and this provides a solid aoe heal on crappy cooldown but aoe heal nonetheless.
Frankly I still think you have no idea what it is that your trying to prove not have you ever used other heals.

Don’t lump everyone and assume everyone sits there with 0 in creativity. Some people are actually creative. Some people min-max. Some people run everything with friends.

Oh and… removing condition heal from it would drop it to one of the smallest heals across the board on the class with the biggest hp pool. Again didn’t really think it through did you?

sorrow.2364:

It’s like Necromancers are the only profession who is capable to mantain permanently Regeneration on allies.

An Arcana elementalist is capable to mantain Might, Regen, Swiftness and Protection on the team just by dancing through attunements. Also, with just 5 points into water magic, an elementalist grants extra healing over time via Soothing Mist. Not to mention the loads of Water Fields they have.

Guardians have a Virtue of Resolve that, when traited, grants its passive effect to the whole team. Also, a guardian, just by dodge-rolling, heals nearby allies for about 1.1k in PvE and 600 in PvP with about 1k healing power at no internal cooldown. Also, about 1k is healed once aegis is removed, when traited.

Mesmer can apply perma-regeneration on allies automatically through http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Phantasmal_Healing

Healing Turret of an engineer is capable to better apply regeneration over time.

Very true. I was going to mention the fact that others have lots of regeneration as well etc., but ran out of characters so I just concentrated on making my point.

A few things though:

Elementalist: Has to switch through attunements to get those boons. Necro only has to spam one skill that just happens to be there go to AoE attack with a 4.8 to 6 second CD. Soothing Mists is great and stacks with the rest of the healing, + Regeneration, but like with all the other water skills, the team only gains the benefits of such when ele is attuned to water. Necromancer can still cycle through all their Mark skills and even other weapon sets after enough stacks of regeneration and still keep regen up or nearly up 24/7. Especially with Mark of Evasion traited. Necros don’t need to choose whether they want to heal, CC or do damage. They can do it all at the same time.

Guardian: Yes they have lots of healing as well. The only downside is that the Guardian and allies have to be within 300-600 range of eachother to gain the full benefits, which of course isn’t a big issue. Necromancers that are support benefit from being in close range as well. Unlike Guardians, we have the option to stay out of a fight and use support at 100% effectiveness from 900-1200 range of allies/enemies. As a Necro I don’t need to run over to an ally to help them, I can just drop stuff on top of them from 900-1200 range in a targeted manner.

Mesmer: Phantasm Healing? Just no. It’s a nice bonus on my mesmer while running reflect phantasm/glamour builds, but a Mesmer specced for concentrating on regeneration or healing just isn’t that effective or viable in my opinion.

Engineer: Healing Turret is a great skill as well for regeneration, but its stationary and can easily be countered/destroyed. Again MoB can easily be placed anywhere within 1200 range of the Necro and is naturally healing/damaging where the fight is actually happening through its dual nature use.

Now my point wasn’t that Necromancer’s are the best healers/buffers in the game. They’re not. My point was that WoB is one of the best group heals when traited, Necromancers don’t just focus on WoB while traiting for support and they have two other potent group heals at their desposal. We can take near full advantage of our numerous area condition application skills + epidemic, traited wells that can offer protection, siphon and serious anti-boon/condition utility, in addition to exploiting Well of Blood/Mark of Blood for AoE healing that can compete with other classes. All while wearing a healing power set (Specifically Apothecary).

That build doesn’t need Consume Conditions nor would it be wise to take it with your already abundant condition management. Actually in a way it would hurt the build. Why would I want to turn my conditions into healing when I already have plenty of it and could turn the conditions into stacks of boons instead, or transfer them back at the enemy with moderately high condition damage ticks?

Balekai.6083:

Very true. I was going to mention the fact that others have lots of regeneration as well etc., but ran out of characters so I just concentrated on making my point.

A few things though:

Elementalist: Has to switch through attunements to get those boons. Necro only has to spam one skill that just happens to be there go to AoE attack with a 4.8 to 6 second CD. Soothing Mists is great and stacks with the rest of the healing, + Regeneration, but like with all the other water skills, the team only gains the benefits of such when ele is attuned to water. Necromancer can still cycle through all their Mark skills and even other weapon sets after enough stacks of regeneration and still keep regen up or nearly up 24/7. Especially with Mark of Evasion traited. Necros don’t need to choose whether they want to heal, CC or do damage. They can do it all at the same time.

Guardian: Yes they have lots of healing as well. The only downside is that the Guardian and allies have to be within 300-600 range of eachother to gain the full benefits, which of course isn’t a big issue. Necromancers that are support benefit from being in close range as well. Unlike Guardians, we have the option to stay out of a fight and use support at 100% effectiveness from 900-1200 range of allies/enemies. As a Necro I don’t need to run over to an ally to help them, I can just drop stuff on top of them from 900-1200 range in a targeted manner.

Mesmer: Phantasm Healing? Just no. It’s a nice bonus on my mesmer while running reflect phantasm/glamour builds, but a Mesmer specced for concentrating on regeneration or healing just isn’t that effective or viable in my opinion.

Engineer: Healing Turret is a great skill as well for regeneration, but its stationary and can easily be countered/destroyed. Again MoB can easily be placed anywhere within 1200 range of the Necro and is naturally healing/damaging where the fight is actually happening through its dual nature use.

Now my point wasn’t that Necromancer’s are the best healers/buffers in the game. They’re not. My point was that WoB is one of the best group heals when traited, Necromancers don’t just focus on WoB while traiting for support and they have two other potent group heals at their desposal. We can take near full advantage of our numerous area condition application skills + epidemic, traited wells that can offer protection, siphon and serious anti-boon/condition utility, in addition to exploiting Well of Blood/Mark of Blood for AoE healing that can compete with other classes. All while wearing a healing power set (Specifically Apothecary).

That build doesn’t need Consume Conditions nor would it be wise to take it with your already abundant condition management. Actually in a way it would hurt the build. Why would I want to turn my conditions into healing when I already have plenty of it and could turn the conditions into stacks of boons instead, or transfer them back at the enemy with moderately high condition damage ticks?

MoB isn’t that reliable as you are saying.
To have a MoB trigger, you need an enemy stepping on it.

In a PvE environment (which I guess it is the situation we are talking about), most bosses and enemies should be fought at range because of their insta-kill abilities at melee range.
If your teammates fight at range, you have no way to reliably give regeneration to your allies, as you can’t give regeneration to any ranged profession.

Soothing Mist stacks in duration, if I’m not wrong, and it is 9 seconds applied each 3 seconds while attuned to water. With Lingering Elements (a trait any elementalist will have), you can easily maintain Soothing Mist permanently, as long as regeneration (attunement dance is a core mechanic of any arcana elementalist).

The point is, why should any serious team bring a support Necromancer over an Elementalist or a Guardian?
There is absolutely no reason to do so.
Why should Necromancers run Apothecary set and force them to have condition damage in PvE when only regen and WoB scale with HP?
There is no reason here too.

sorrow.2364:

MoB isn’t that reliable as you are saying.
To have a MoB trigger, you need an enemy stepping on it.

In a PvE environment (which I guess it is the situation we are talking about), most bosses and enemies should be fought at range because of their insta-kill abilities at melee range.
If your teammates fight at range, you have no way to reliably give regeneration to your allies, as you can’t give regeneration to any ranged profession.

Soothing Mist stacks in duration, if I’m not wrong, and it is 9 seconds applied each 3 seconds while attuned to water. With Lingering Elements (a trait any elementalist will have), you can easily maintain Soothing Mist permanently, as long as regeneration (attunement dance is a core mechanic of any arcana elementalist).

The point is, why should any serious team bring a support Necromancer over an Elementalist or a Guardian?
There is absolutely no reason to do so.
Why should Necromancers run Apothecary set and force them to have condition damage in PvE when only regen and WoB scale with HP?
There is no reason here too.

I just facepalmed when you said you should range in pve. You have something called dodge, you should try it sometime. You are right about no decent group taking a necro though.

spoj.9672:

I just facepalmed when you said you should range in pve. You have something called dodge, you should try it sometime.

You should really try fractals.

Also, all the toughest bosses, when you really need some support, can’t be done in melee range. Take Lupicus, for instance.

sorrow.2364:

spoj.9672:

I just facepalmed when you said you should range in pve. You have something called dodge, you should try it sometime.

You should really try fractals.

Also, all the toughest bosses, when you really need some support, can’t be done in melee range. Take Lupicus, for instance.

Thats funny because the only boss i range is the shaman in grawl fractal. Melee’d GL plenty of times. Also never range trash mobs in fractals, los and cleave/aoe them down quickly.

spoj.9672:

Thats funny because the only boss i range is the shaman in grawl fractal. Melee’d GL plenty of times. Also never range trash mobs in fractals, los and cleave/aoe them down quickly.

So you also melee Ashym, Dredge Powersuit, Ice Elemental and Old Tom.
I guess you also kill attack face to face Mossman and Bloomhunger.

I’d really like to see how fast your team wipe when doing those bosses in melee.

sorrow.2364:

spoj.9672:

Thats funny because the only boss i range is the shaman in grawl fractal. Melee’d GL plenty of times. Also never range trash mobs in fractals, los and cleave/aoe them down quickly.

So you also melee Ashym, Dredge Powersuit, Ice Elemental and Old Tom.
I guess you also kill attack face to face Mossman and Bloomhunger.

I’d really like to see how fast your team wipe when doing those bosses in melee.

Yeah, although on dredge and ice elemental you do range while kiting, but melee burst under the lava to speed the kill up. Bloomhunger is easier in melee. Mossman is probably the hardest to melee but entirely possible with a good group. Ashym you only need to range for the last 25% of his hp to stop him from using the fiery gs. And you range old tom? lol.

spoj.9672:

sorrow.2364:

spoj.9672:

Thats funny because the only boss i range is the shaman in grawl fractal. Melee’d GL plenty of times. Also never range trash mobs in fractals, los and cleave/aoe them down quickly.

So you also melee Ashym, Dredge Powersuit, Ice Elemental and Old Tom.
I guess you also kill attack face to face Mossman and Bloomhunger.

I’d really like to see how fast your team wipe when doing those bosses in melee.

Yeah, although on dredge and ice elemental you do range while kiting, but melee burst under the lava to speed the kill up. Bloomhunger is easier in melee. Mossman is probably the hardest to melee but entirely possible with a good group. Ashym you only need to range for the last 25% of his hp to stop him from using the fiery gs. And you range old tom? lol.

+1 to this post. If OP doesn’t know how vastly melee dominates over range in most of the PvE encounters, that means that nothing is left to discuss.

sorrow.2364:

/snip

The point is, why should any serious team bring a support Necromancer over an Elementalist or a Guardian?
There is absolutely no reason to do so.
Why should Necromancers run Apothecary set and force them to have condition damage in PvE when only regen and WoB scale with HP?
There is no reason here too.

You didn’t answer my question though. Why would I use CC instead of WoB with that build, especially when it can hinder condition control by evaporating the conditions into healing instead of turning them back on enemies or converting to boons?

Your original arguement is and has been that consume conditions is better in all situations. Mine (and those of others) has been that with certain builds filling out certain roles, with great viability, that Consume Conditions is not the go to choice all the time. Which even if you nerfed CC and/or buffed the others, would still be used by most Necro’s because of its reliable, quick self heal mechanics.

It hasn’t been “Why would I take build x (Necro Support) into situation y (a fractal boss fight where you want to keep at range) when I could take x (Guardian, Ele etc.) for my idea of an optimal group?” We could dance around specific situations all day for any class and builds where mechanics may hinder them. We all know that Necro in general isn’t looked upon as optimal in dungeons, because there’s little need for conditions or condition/boon control (design flaws by Anet). Only pure dps, reflection and the ability for teams to survive the encounters for as long as it takes to kill enemies. If there were more enemies in PVE that played a lot more with boons and conditions (like players do), I would argue Necro Support would become very popular.

What you say about MoB is true though. In a PVE, wide open area where range is preffered against a say a single target enemy/boss, MoB is not going to fullfill it’s secondary regeneration function. That’s the downside. The unfortunate upside is that such boss fights are very kite dependent and support of any kind isn’t needed, or only Guardian support is useful since no one stays in one place for .5 seconds. In WvW/Spvp, MoB is always being triggered on you and others, so a non issue.

However, the question still becomes how often does that happen where everyone is always more than 240 range away from an enemy or boss? The answer is not very much especially with your fractal which you like to use as an example. You have three bosses in fractals that people shouldn’t be close to: Mining Suit/Ice Golem, Captain and Shaman phase two.

On Mining Suit/Ice Golem people are always close at the lava and in at least 240 range and is where people are at the most risk of taking damage. Meaning people are going to be WoB or MoB 300 tick healing if needed on those points. However since I am mostly just condition damage as Apothecary Support, I usually volunteer to run lava since support isn’t needed if the team is good.

Captain is fine and the Urban fractal in general is where a Necro Support build actually shines. I’m able to convert those 25 stacks of might etc on enemies into conditions, while granting protection, CCing with Chill, Weakness, and indefinitely healing the NPCs/allies with WoB, other Wells, MoB, in addition to loads of condition stacks + Epidemic from the safety of 900-1200 range. Specifically on the Captain the NPCs would only get about 1-5 seconds more up time on higher levels. You still have WoB and I usually spec for Ritual of Life for Boss fights, so I get a second one on reviving an ally. But captain is easy from 900-1200 range anyways. MoB is nice for triggering regen on an ally being chased by squire and like the rest of the Marks, you can trigger them 1440 range away from Capt. Other class support is going to have just as many problems as people are spread out at 1500-2000 range form eachother. Unlike an Ele I don’t have to set up water fields to get the most out of my healing in a 24/7 kite situation.

Then there’s the Shaman. I love my Guardian (support) and Mesmer (reflection) for this, but this is a fight my Necro actually comes in handy as well. Out of those three classes my Necro kite kills lava elementals on par with Mesmer (AoE bleeds and CC), while still being able to heal myself or my team on the other side of the Boss room.

And for the rest of the boss fractals not everyone stays at 900 range or more. More often than not you’re all going to be fighting in close quarters, stacking, kiting or dodging enemies/bosses within 100 to 600 range. The same goes for most PVE areas. Meaning most of the time a Necro support build is being used for full effectiveness. If I know its not optimal for an extended period? I change my build from Support to Rabid Conditionmancer or log onto one of my other fully equiped classes with Power/Support (Guardian) or Toughness/Offense (Mesmer) builds.