Guild Wars 2

I’m just getting seriously bored of the build variety.

It’s either :

Curses Staff + Sceptre/X + Corruptions

or

Spite Staff + AxeDagger/Focus + Wells

There’s just no interesting traits, or combinations for fun effects.

I agree, something needs to be done very quickly…I really am a trooper but I’m close to giving up.

Have you looked at traits that were removed from thegame? http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/List_of_historical_traits Maybe that can help you brainstorm, plus it gives you an idea as to the evolution of all the professions.

Too much of the Necromancer’s balance was tipped because of Death Shroud. Balancing around having “two life bars” made them take away a lot from the other areas.

Most classes have leaps, teleports and shadowsteps or other mobility movement skills that are usable without a target. All until recently, we had none to speak of, now we have Spectral Walk which is a huge upgrade from before, but it’s still far from the free range motion other classes can do. Dark Path is NOT it, it’s way limited compared to even just a regular leap.

Death Shroud also used to break stuns, that’s why a lot of our skills that break stun happen to be on longer CDs. We have no reliable stun breaks that is under a minute in CD. This is something all other classes have. Shadowstep, the thief utility very similar to Spectral Walk in function breaks stun going both ways and is a 50s CD. Flesh Worm is a 40s CD, but it also requires set up first, it’s unlike the instant stun break abilities. When they took out the stun break from DShroud (Yea it was OP), they also did not add anything to compensate.

Our strongest defensive CD is Spectral Armor, its CD is on parr with Endure Pain and is LONGER than Myst Form. Necromancers have no need of an invul but when you look at other defensive CDs, our seems pretty whack. 6s of Protection, that’s something other classes have a 20-30s CD. Elementalists have Armor of Earth which share the same CD, it gives 8s of Protection and 8s of Stability, completely outclasses ours and we don’t have other choices like they do. I know it generates LF when hit, but that also means you have to put yourself more in harms way to gain a benefit than any other class. If you look at other defensive CDs most classes have, it’s either a quick evade/re-positioning or outright immunity.

It all comes back to Dshroud, because it was TOO good, all they’ve done is butcher it with every single development decision. Right now, they don’t want to give Necros a bone because Dshroud makes it too hard to balance and they can easily make the class too powerful. But because of this, the status quo right now is we have a crap class mechanic that is under performing, since it’s also dictating our balance, the rest of our toolkit is really watered down.

TLDR: Because of Dshroud, our mobility/escapes, defensive cds, and everything else is whack.

some food for your mind:
DS is a tool for survivability with good AOE and base DMG, can give you might (stack), can give vulnerability.
Conditions can be burst with 16 stacks of might (blood is power with plague signet, Signet of Spite) and ofc… you can add some more with DS…
scepter with haste on it can apply bleed so fast even if it’s for 3 sec’ and without it can maintain you bleed.
As condition necro you can get 15% LF from scepter 3 if you use signet of spite before and when bugs are fixed you can add 5% more from Gluttony in soul reaping trait…

Don’t say “useless” before you think of all your options… it’s not that bad… not much of variety in our game style and traits… and weapons… but we can handle with it till arenanet will hear our call.

What if they made Death Shroud a combo tool?

Skill 1 would be projectile, 2 would be leap, 3 would be blast, and 4 would be whirl.

I’ve decided to use only axe in pvp. I will be a burden to my team and continue to bring them down because of my useless weapon until Arenanet fixes it. I like the theme behind the axe and am disappointed at how obviously week it is.

There are so many things wrong with this class. Like if we are supposed to be the class that’s thematically masters of conditions, I understand that we aren’t the best at boons. But every other class seems better equipped to create boons and conditions, at the same time, than we are at just creating conditions. I see threads on here boasting a build that can keep a certain boon or condition up all the time and it’s sad because other classes can do the same thing with ease. I thought I had a good build one day that worked around keeping protection up as long as possible. I tried it on the pvp npcs and thought it was great. Then I watch an engineer come along and he had protection up all the time and it was on a 20 second during. And I realized I wasted my time fighting to keep up protection when other classes are far better at it.

The class has huge problems. People can discuss strategies and work arounds all day but those are just bandaids and pushing so hard to make a class work at a sup par level compared to all other classes proves fixes (not just bug fixes) absolutely need to be made.

Lumines.3916:

Too much of the Necromancer’s balance was tipped because of Death Shroud. Balancing around having “two life bars” made them take away a lot from the other areas.

Most classes have leaps, teleports and shadowsteps or other mobility movement skills that are usable without a target. All until recently, we had none to speak of, now we have Spectral Walk which is a huge upgrade from before, but it’s still far from the free range motion other classes can do. Dark Path is NOT it, it’s way limited compared to even just a regular leap.

Death Shroud also used to break stuns, that’s why a lot of our skills that break stun happen to be on longer CDs. We have no reliable stun breaks that is under a minute in CD. This is something all other classes have. Shadowstep, the thief utility very similar to Spectral Walk in function breaks stun going both ways and is a 50s CD. Flesh Worm is a 40s CD, but it also requires set up first, it’s unlike the instant stun break abilities. When they took out the stun break from DShroud (Yea it was OP), they also did not add anything to compensate.

Our strongest defensive CD is Spectral Armor, its CD is on parr with Endure Pain and is LONGER than Myst Form. Necromancers have no need of an invul but when you look at other defensive CDs, our seems pretty whack. 6s of Protection, that’s something other classes have a 20-30s CD. Elementalists have Armor of Earth which share the same CD, it gives 8s of Protection and 8s of Stability, completely outclasses ours and we don’t have other choices like they do. I know it generates LF when hit, but that also means you have to put yourself more in harms way to gain a benefit than any other class. If you look at other defensive CDs most classes have, it’s either a quick evade/re-positioning or outright immunity.

It all comes back to Dshroud, because it was TOO good, all they’ve done is butcher it with every single development decision. Right now, they don’t want to give Necros a bone because Dshroud makes it too hard to balance and they can easily make the class too powerful. But because of this, the status quo right now is we have a crap class mechanic that is under performing, since it’s also dictating our balance, the rest of our toolkit is really watered down.

TLDR: Because of Dshroud, our mobility/escapes, defensive cds, and everything else is whack.

+1000000000

EXACTLY how I feel about DS “ruining” our class.

@Archinos and @ruinous

You guys make great points as well, didn’t want this to be a long kitten message lol. I agree we have SOME options Archinos, but we still have to work so hard to produce to little compared to many other classes. I haven’t played every class so can’t say all classes, but Thief and Warrior got it going on!

ruinous, we should all do that, just use axe only and make a necro statement as we burden and die lol At the end of the day at least we got a cool “spinny” axe animation right? lol

I wouldn’t say it’s “ruining” the class because the concept at its core, a TANKY caster juggling two health bars intrigued me a lot. However, it’s just the execution of it along with the cons that came with it makes me question it. It’ll still be awhile before they finish fine tuning it that’s for sure..

And ruinous is right on track, the Necromancer as a whole, is too “negative” of a profession. On the spectrum of boons/conditions, they stack heavily onto the condition side of things. Instead of Protection, we’re supposed to use Weakness, instead of Aegis, we’re supposed to use blind. And that’s fine and all until you look at the flip side of things, the Guardian.

Guardians may have more limited access to damaging conditions, but they don’t need those, they scale very well with power, plus the one they do get burns! They also may have very limited access to Weakness, but it’s still there in the Spirit Shield and Signet of Judgement. They also have blinds seeping out a lot of their weapon sets, from the gapclosers for both sword/greatsword, off-hand focus to traited virtues. What you get is a class that can mitigate damage tactfully from BOTH sides of the boon/condition spectrum despite the class leans heavily on the boon side.

Well Necromancers? Boons? What boons, unless you go far out for them, you won’t see much until you group up with someone else. Hell, even the class most similar to the Necromancer the Mesmer has boons coming out their butts 24/7 when wielding a Staff.

Conditions in the end may be easier to reapply and what not, but there are also a lot more condition removals than boon removals. A lot of the top classes can juggle both boons/conditions, the necro is left with just mostly conditions.

It’s ruining the chance at ever seeing love is what I mean. Guardians like you said, very tanky, but since no second health bar they got all kinds of love during creation and still mitigate damage amazingly. Who needs a second health bar when you have so many great skills that block and mitigate incoming damage?

I would trade the second bar in a heartbeat if it meant us getting off of this ridiculously low damage table, and the addition of some boons.

Give us 20% damage mitigation, a boon and MAYBE 10-15% damage reflect + random condition output for a small time and remove 50% or more of the second bar while in DS = what I’d do, but just my opinion.

Maybe you pop DS and it gives half the current second bar health but gives 2-3 random conditions (lasting 10 seconds each) in a frontal 900 range cone aoe? With a small chance to get burning condition? Maybe 50% chance of getting 10-15 seconds of a random boon (could be a set boon and not random decided by devs) when exiting DS?

I’m just throwing ideas out there hoping for the best.

A large part of why it feels that Death Shroud is “ruining” anything, is likely because it’s a transformation skill in similar vein to Plague and Lich Form. A second health bar is largely wasted if you aren’t doing anything with it other than to survive a little longer, it simply means you prolong the inevitable in several cases.

Ideally Death Shroud would be more in line with it’s origin name, that of a a shroud enveloped around a dead person for burial. It should be an effect/buff that supplements the class, not substitutes the abilities entirely. Plague and Lich Form already does that.

Looking at some of the removed Traits there’s plenty of ideas that got dismissed that should or could easily be worked into a reworked Death Shroud ability. Lich Form should serve the role as the transformation-go-to ability that Death Shroud is presently and Death Shroud should be reworked to offer something different, could be fixed CD abilities.

You’re right about Guardians. I miss having block as a Necromancer, even if blind is more useful (block only affects you, whereas blind prevents it from hitting anybody). I think block skills are more reactive though, I love the Mesmer scepter 2 and offhand sword 1. I love when I see “Block” text over my head as well. Having them miss or glance, it doesn’t have it’s own special graphic.

Guaridans and Necromancers are supposed to be foils I believe. Since Guardians are so well off that will also help to brainstorm possible alternatives for Necromancer, going through Guardian seeing how one could “invert” their skills/traits.

Personally, I dont’ see why going into Death Shroud instantly reduces Life Force even when just standing there. Maybe it should be linked to a certain number of skill uses as well.

Tanky caster idea went out of the window back in bw… sad considering we lost damage how many times now? But were never given anything in return. Now our conditions have the lowest durations… we have no burst damage that is even remotely comparable. Full might spec ds blast after bip and wall+focus vul and u still get misrable tops 5k hit for what? 1 – 2 shots then ds blast goes down fast…. and your left with dagger…. great… aside from the fact that necros are the only class with melee weapon that doesnt cleave. Melee attacks on other classes hit for more then we do with power build special abilities 2s on d/a for instance.
This class is not tanky at all considering we have no stun breaks that are on short or comparatively to other classes short cd. We got no stabilities what so ever. Our few protection applying abilities have longer cd with less duration and do not apply other effects unlike other classes….
Considering bleed is our 1 and only damaging condition past a joke of poison. And theres that nice cap of 25…. also the duration and traits for duration that dont even work. We end up with least damaging conditions. Or to be technical…. condition lol. Epidemic was good up until it lost its range… now if i make sure theres no magical bushes and rocks in a way to block and make me waste cd… target is too far away.
For gods sake I thought concept of not using skill if target is out of range/los was over a decade old… hell ultima used it… aparently not guild wars tho. And the list just keeps on rolling…. every aspect we are rock steady bottom of the barrel. Except for the amount of pets we can have out at once. Too bad they all die in 1 aoe. Why do we jagged horrors?

Greatest lol moment: watching us blow through 5-10 skills + an elite trying to max damage output, then watching a short bow ranger do what took us 20 seconds to build up in about 5-10, knowing the ranger has plenty of other builds and probably is just dabbling in a condition spec.

Thank you Anet for an official comedy profession.

I like DS but I think it should allow the use of utilities while active and of course let us see health, endurance and boons/conditions. I don’t see why it should completely change the UI when it just as easily could’ve just changed the 1-4 weapon abilities, leaving the 5th blank.

I think an F2 function should be added which trades life force for Might. More life force lost = more might gained. This works well with condition builds as well as burst builds, since current power specs aren’t exactly bursty unless you use wells. Even with power builds, DS usage is mostly for strong sustained DPS but necro burst is non-existent. The BiP change is pretty much what I would’ve done but for for an F2 function instead of changing the life force generator. This works well with a dagger build which is supposedly bursty, since they generate life force fast, and with builds that aren’t interested in the survivability or control aspects of DS and would rather have a boost to their conditions/DD. Add a trait that gives stun break on activation and you have a stun break (which is needed because current stun breaks are on a massive CD). You could even add a trait that gives a boon to minions when activated as well, to help out the minion masters that don’t want to sit in DS and soak damage while minions do the work. Furious Demise and Near to Death should both apply to the new ability. Retaliation and Stability are more for the tanky oriented DS users though and should stay that way.

Alternatively you can make it a nuke that expels all life force but this doesn’t help condition builds all that much and doesn’t offer much interesting since DS #1 does a similar thing.

Necros need work on some trait lines and of course a massive amount of bugfixes but I like the mechanic and most abilities. I just think a second optional mechanic should be added that doesn’t involve the 2nd health bar aspect of necros. This way it is easier to balance and fits into a lot more specs that want to be more bursty without the Anet contstraints on damage due to DS survivability advantage. I also agree with what other posters have said about certain classes having too much burst however necro lacks a lot of the boons other classes have and don’t really outclass them in survivability to warrant it. You should be able to play necros bursty if you want, same as if you want to continue using current DS to be more endurance, attrition and control focused.

Simply put. DS should be a steroid and not a kit. It should perhaps open 3-4 new abilitys while its up, but i think you should still be able to use your other abilitys. If they have to nerf the damage absorption for it so be it. 50% damage goes to life force, speacial abilitys consume life force to be used and do more damage (thus it has use).

Or completely beat it with a stick and give necros a 2hnd damage weapon option. Honestly the biggest problem with power dps, is everything is channeled or has a freakish cast time on it. Seriously go play other professions (i play all but elementalist and warrior FREQUENTLY in pvp) nothing comes close to necro on cast times and channeling times. Some of these (most the offhand abilitys) do not need to be so long, cut em in half atleast.

EDIT: you’d think we were op with all our stuff having cast times leaving us more open to interrupt counter than any other profession.

The issues you just mentioned are balance issues which can easily be changed but it doesn’t affect the design problems that DS adds survivability inherent to your class whether you want it or not. Therefore, necro specs aren’t allowed to be bursty because you get this added survivability as well. IMO the best course of action is to add a 2nd bursty option. I also just considered the idea that this 2nd ability adds a short AOE fear if traited for, to give the burster a tiny bit of an escape or attack window.