Guild Wars 2

Do other classes have the same issue? Are Mesmer clones or whatever their class defining ability is, not that great unless you specifically tune your build specifically for them?

Just like our minions…only really useful if you actually specialize in them. Otherwise, most are useless.

Is this fair at all or am I way off mark?

I don’t think so, I have created a 30 point DS build and to be honest untill our vampiric traits are fixed like +50% increase to healing etc, Its not beefy enough to do things like heal in area when leaving DS on a 5 second cooldown, using fast dagger attacks to build life force.

But what I have found it usefull if offensive and defensive strategies in WvW being primarilly a WvW necro only. For instance, 10 points in power give life blast and plague blast stack might for 15 seconds, or use the trait for 20 points in staff for AoE vunerability when you enter DS you could I guess, go 30 DS 20 dagger and 20 staff and every 5 seconds AE heal and cause vunerability while building DS with fast dagger attacks up close that heal you for like 80 health a pop x target " but thats kinda broke"

I use a WvW well power build with 30 in spite , 20 in curses and 20 in staff, my first trait in spite is stack might with lifeblast and plauge blast, so I lead with those typically if the enemy is close and then switch out after 2x stacks, if I ahve 25 stacks of bloodlust I hit pretty hard over 1k dagger attacks with 2-3k finisher and lifesiphon finishes in the 4k range.

Well thief’s steal is not good at all unless traited into, I’d easily say DS is way better stock as it can be used as a bubble or Aoe life drain. Mesmers shatter doesn’t really need to be specced into but it can definitely help. Eles attunements definitely need speccing into. Pretty much most classes defining abilities need to be specced in some way or another.

I apologize Jarlax, but unless I’m misunderstanding you, I think you may have missed the point of the OP. He (or she?) is arguing/implying that DS is lackluster unless you spend your traits making it better. Given that your examples rely on Reaper’s Might (which is a traited ability) it actually sounds more like you agree with his point, rather than disagree.

Back on topic: this is something I’ve been thinking about a lot myself. I run a somewhat unorthodox 30/15/0/0/25 Build (30 in spite, 15 in Curses, 25 in Soul Reaping) that is the latest experimentation in a “Death Shroud/Debuffing” build.

I wouldn’t say my build “fixes” whatever balance issues necro may or may not have, but with it I can sort of see what Mr. Peters was getting at with his infamous “We’re worried about how death shroud might play out (paraphrasing here, of course)” quote.

Just as an example, I run with Enfeebling Shroud, and it is not insignificant that I cause thirteen seconds of weakness (50% chance for glancing blows) in a radius around me at the same time that I activate what has been referred to as “my second life bar.” Throw in things like “gain might with life blast” and “life blast pierces and causes vulnerability,” etc.. etc.. and it can get pretty nuts pretty quickly.

Without these traits though…..

TL/DR: I think the OP may have a point.

But should it be ‘really great’ without speccing into it? DS is very good if you spec for it, but it is still a very nice ability to have without putting any points towards it. You won’t be using it offensively very much but it is amazing defensively. I don’t think it is really fair to make DS a super ability just by virtue of having it and not needing to build around it.

Krestfallen.8025:

Back on topic: this is something I’ve been thinking about a lot myself. I run a somewhat unorthodox 30/15/0/0/25 Build (30 in spite, 15 in Curses, 25 in Soul Reaping) that is the latest experimentation in a “Death Shroud/Debuffing” build.

Are…are you my twin? I have the EXACT same trait allocation, except that I focus on Marks.
Since I can’t find a decent build calculator,

For spite 30 points:
Reaper’s Might
Spiteful Marks
Close to Death

Curses 15 points:
Reaper’s Precision

Soul Reaping 25 points:
Vital Persistence
Soul Marks

I generate a buttload of life force so I’m in DS roughly 50-70% of the time.

Thieves’ Steal is borderline OP even w/o traits in pvp.

PvE on the other hand yeah.

^ @Uchi: I guess great minds think alike ~_^ I ended up focusing on Vulnerability/Weakness because my friends and I tend to run dungeons a lot and I felt that consistent debuffs was something (relatively) unique I could bring to the table.

Back on topic: Ultimately I agree with you Olkyr, it shouldn’t be “super great” all on its own.

However, I think what we’re running into here is what I personally (emphasis on personally) consider to be the fundamental design “flaw” of Death Shroud. If you look at the way other class mechanics work, they’re all abilities that player can use in addition to all their other weapon skills, utility slots, elites, etc… whereas with us, using death shroud actually locks us out of all our other abilities.

This puts us in a position where unless you build specifically for DS, everytime you use it you’re being asked to make a trade off. The most extreme example of this is with Conditionmancers:— yes, DS can help them stay alive, but then they’re no longer able to stack conditions and thus lose the central focus of their particular playstyle (you’ll note that this, and complaints like this, are very common across the necro forum right now).

Any Gaurdian, regardless of spec, gets benefits from virtues. Any mesmer utilizes shatters. There’s no reason not to steal on any type of thief. No reason not to use adrenaline on a warrior, etc… etc… etc… (classes chosen at random as rhetorical devices only, this is not meant as any kind of particular balance comparison).

I’m not (and I don’t think anyone should be) arguing that DS needs to be some sort of “super” skill. But what it needs (only in my opinion, of course), is to be useful to all Necromancers regardless of how one spends their trait points.

One thing that bugs me about DS is that unless you’re in the middle of a group and able to regain your life force without taking much damage as you fight – it’s almost useless after the first use.

I was dueling in a PvP server with a friend for fun and to train. He was a ranger and I a necro, our first fight I had full life force, it went amazingly – I dealt damage, used elite to stay alive longer and deal damage, then used DS on and off to use fear and deal so moderate damage here and there and I managed to beat him.

However, after that first fight I used up all my life force and every single other fights after that first one I lost desperately – because since there weren’t many things dying around me or because I didn’t have either a gap of time or safety to up my life force, it was just gone for good.

So in conclusion, not only is the DS under powered unless you actually focus on it, and not only does it fit well in maybe 1-2 builds, but it’s such a limited use ability that unless we’re in a convenient and specific situation – it’s useless after one or two uses.

The ranger’s ability is having a pet with them at all times that do a variety of effects, the mesmer is the ability to shatter and do a variety of effects, guardians have their virtues either always in effect or they can use it for an instant effect and are able to get it back without much effort, just waiting for the cooldown. So in general every class has something that is in a way “always there” and can be of a very broad use, while for the necro to use his already limited ability he needs to be able to kill things first. Unlike other classes he doesn’t have an effect which is either always there or easily accessible – he either has full life force and can rely on the DS, or simply not and thus screwed.

I have a similiar thread focusing on how it isnt fun for most people. It is true that the deathshroud’s uniqueness is kinda its downfall. It puts you into a state where your unable to use your other abilitys…ontop of being a resource requiring ability.

Gaurdian 3 buff abilitys that will always be useful that is useful in any playstyle while doing anyting.

Theif steal never not worth using, very good in pvp.

Ranger gets a pet thus always extra damage and utility at all times.

Engineer toolbelt skills. Gets 4 extra abilitys irrigardless of how he traits or what he does.

Sorc can always attune for differnet abilitys.

Mesmer alway worth while blowing up your extra clones/phants

Wars adrenaline is always good.

Necromancer however has to change into another form where they drop all their abilitys and utility for 4 abilitys 3 of which have semi-long to long cd’s. This means after you use em if you build up a full deathshroud bar its only worth going into to take hits and do “untraited unspecced for it” a slow firing nuke that might be doing less damage than your auto outside of deathshroud particularly if your conditionmancer.

My suggestion in my thread was to change it so its a temp buff that maybe unlocks temp extra abilitys or empowers certain abilitys or flat out is just a temp steroid for damage and damage reduction. Anything that helps you but allows you to continue use your abilitys do it doesnt come off as something unfun that might pull you out of your play style or just isnt useful in your situation outside being heavily traited into.

DS is still great even without traiting it only for the very reason that when stunned you can go into it and fear I mean lol, what class gets a free health pool they can go to when they are getting bursted with a strong move.

Zinwrath.2049:

Gaurdian 3 buff abilitys that will always be useful that is useful in any playstyle while doing anyting.

Theif steal never not worth using, very good in pvp.

Ranger gets a pet thus always extra damage and utility at all times.

Engineer toolbelt skills. Gets 4 extra abilitys irrigardless of how he traits or what he does.

Sorc can always attune for differnet abilitys.

Mesmer alway worth while blowing up your extra clones/phants

Wars adrenaline is always good.

Eh, this kind of seems like a “grass is always greener” kind of thing.

I haven’t played every profession extensively, but I can say that, for instance, an engineer doesn’t always get a lot of use out of their paired abilities. Sometimes you’re slotting a utility skill only for its toolbelt skill or vice versa.

The ranger’s pet is only modestly useful if you don’t build around it. Hell, they have so many problems with pathing and targeting that sometimes they aren’t useful even if you do build for them. I think most necromancer players are familiar with some of the limitations of pets in this game.

Mesmer illusion shatters can have the same issue. The shatter skills are only useful if the illusions are in the right place, and often they’re not.

Elementalists can always use their attunements, sure, but they’re locked into the extra skills that they get instead of being able to mix and match different weapon skills like other professions can.

Basically, everybody’s got some limitations to work with. Death Shroud is, at worst, a large pool of extra hitpoints you can lean on to survive a bit longer while you wait on cooldowns. If you build for it, it can also be a significant source of damage. It’s pretty well in line with other profession mechanics.

“Death Shroud is, at worst, a large pool of extra hitpoints you can lean on to survive a bit longer while you wait on cooldowns. If you build for it, it can also be a significant source of damage.”

I actually agree with your assessment of our relative ability strength, Stice, but I think where we differ is in our interpretation of it either being, or not being a problem.

What I feel is a “problem” is how disparate the line between “bag of hitpoints” and “damage machine” is. Surviving— while certainly desirable— isn’t really a goal in and of itself.

There have been times when I have indeed used DS as a means to stall out for cooldowns. But if it can’t also do damage (that is, if I haven’t properly traited and geared for it), then while I’m messing about waiting for that crucial heal to recharge (for example), my opponent is also messing about waiting for that crucial heal to recharge (just for example).

I can’t really think of any circumstance where employing a class mechanic can actually provide respite for other players (except for obvious stuff like “I’m so glad that warrior didn’t target me, etc… etc…”).

Again, I want to emphasis that we’re mostly talking about degrees of magnitutde here. Is this an end of the world, sole cause of class imbalance, brokenly awful thing? Not at all. Remember, I spec for death shroud. I love death shroud. I do, however, think that this “all or nothing” approach when it comes to stat and gear allocation is a contributing factor to the current state of necros (however one chooses to evaluate them at present).

the problem is DS is only marginally useful to non-power (condition or MM) necros.

The autoattack damage is quite low, fear is very short /situational, spectral grasp is ? for a non-dagger spec and life transfer does nothing for 1v1 (granted it’s quite nice for groups if traited, or for aoe tagging mobs… which could also be a bad thing).

For a pet necro, other than traited life transfer, it’s ENTIRELY useless. You can’t even control your pets in it (and the golem actually stops moving completely), which is just silly.

I agree with the OP. DS needs to be more useful to non-DS oriented builds, and a LOT more useful for DS-oriented builds, than just 4 buttons of which only 1 is really good.

If it wasn’t for the traited might gain and transfusion traits for DS I wouldn’t use it period on my minion master necro. I only really use it for the meager utility it gives and nothing more.

@Stice
The mesmer’s shatter only being useful if they’re in the right place? That’s completely incorrect, I play a mesmer as well and when I use a shatter so often I’ve seen the clones just chasing after my target for some 5 seconds before shattering, not once have they ever simply shattered where they stood and made it useless, they always home into your target before shattering.

Also it is nice to have a (very unreliable and quickly degenerating) extra health pool but if while you have this second HP bar if you’re not able to do anything useful while in it, it’s just doing you more harm than good. Because with the way people say it, it’s as if the game just stops for you when you go into DS and thus you have a better chance of survival – this is completely not true because while you’re wasting time in DS form not able to do anything good, your opponents are still there still able to use their abilities and still able to kick your kitten one way or another.

Whenever I’m using another class to play and I go against a necromancer and I see them going into DS form the first thing I think is “I beat him”, why? Because while in DS form I have absolutely NO fear (no pun intended) of him at all because I know while in DS mode he poses no threat to me and it also means that once the DS form is gone I’ll be able to quickly dispose of him.

The only time DS is useful is if you spec into it, focus on it completely and strictly run a damage build – and still it’s a form which is very consequential because if you’re 1vs1 with someone and you use up the DS, there is no way you’re gonna be getting it back until that battle is over.

Unspecced DS is pretty much just useful for buying a few seconds. In 1v1 its use is pretty limited but I use it when I’m waiting for a key cooldown to recharge or something like that. In group situations it is more useful since it gives you a few second to get bailed out by a friend.

Delryn.7235:

@Stice
The mesmer’s shatter only being useful if they’re in the right place? That’s completely incorrect, I play a mesmer as well and when I use a shatter so often I’ve seen the clones just chasing after my target for some 5 seconds before shattering, not once have they ever simply shattered where they stood and made it useless, they always home into your target before shattering.

Also it is nice to have a (very unreliable and quickly degenerating) extra health pool but if while you have this second HP bar if you’re not able to do anything useful while in it, it’s just doing you more harm than good. Because with the way people say it, it’s as if the game just stops for you when you go into DS and thus you have a better chance of survival – this is completely not true because while you’re wasting time in DS form not able to do anything good, your opponents are still there still able to use their abilities and still able to kick your kitten one way or another.

Whenever I’m using another class to play and I go against a necromancer and I see them going into DS form the first thing I think is “I beat him”, why? Because while in DS form I have absolutely NO fear (no pun intended) of him at all because I know while in DS mode he poses no threat to me and it also means that once the DS form is gone I’ll be able to quickly dispose of him.

The only time DS is useful is if you spec into it, focus on it completely and strictly run a damage build – and still it’s a form which is very consequential because if you’re 1vs1 with someone and you use up the DS, there is no way you’re gonna be getting it back until that battle is over.

Disagreed, even when not specced DS still has the same amount of pool as your health, and can be accessed at anytime. When you’re trying to blow your combo, 100b, frenzy blades, pistol whip, whatever your burst is and a necro goes to DS to negate that damage then comes out of it like nothing happened only to build it back up again. It can change the outcome of the battle, just have to know when to use it.

What you said Zogyark would be completely valid if you were able to predict ahead of time in the future what abilities your enemies were going to use and how, and when. Unfortunately if you just enter DS hoping to avoid some major damage you might just waste your life force and it’s just completely done for the rest of the fight. It’s true that your life force is equal to your HP, however your HP does not degenerate with time and while out of DS you’re able to actually be effective in battle – while with DS on you lose all your precious strategy and abilities and instead get 4 abilities which are virtually completely useless for most builds unless they are completely DS focused.

Delryn.7235:

What you said Zogyark would be completely valid if you were able to predict ahead of time in the future what abilities your enemies were going to use and how, and when. Unfortunately if you just enter DS hoping to avoid some major damage you might just waste your life force and it’s just completely done for the rest of the fight. It’s true that your life force is equal to your HP, however your HP does not degenerate with time and while out of DS you’re able to actually be effective in battle – while with DS on you lose all your precious strategy and abilities and instead get 4 abilities which are virtually completely useless for most builds unless they are completely DS focused.

To be honest you can somewhat predict depending on the weapons of your enemies for example a GS warrior casting signet of rage is most likely going to bullrush you at any point, same with sword/pistol thief, or a sword mesmer will most likely use #2 on you as soon as he can. it’s just a matter of reaction

However a rule of thumb is if you get stunned, something big is most likely to follow. It’s just a matter of experience PvPing that it becomes an instinct when these burst damages are happening. DS is also good to buy you time while you’re waiting on CDs. I don’t spend much time in DS but it’s good to have it there as this defense tool with a 10 second cooldown I’m very thankful for it and miss it dearly when playing with other professions.

Also it’s not about predicting when and hoping the enemy does the attack after you’re in DS, it’s going into DS right after the enemy starts their combo.

Of course the DS isn’t useless, however as it currently is feels extremely underwhelming in usefulness compared to so many other classes. With the DS you are at a disadvantage in two situations, if you’re in a group vs group and in the middle of a chaotic battle then you simply will not be able to predict when someone is going to do something, that is simply unrealistic – at best you can try focusing on one or two people to see what they’re doing but that won’t do you much good if a third person sneaks up behind you and back stabs you.

Another disadvantage is when going 1vs1, if your DS is full you can easily counter and avoid some big damage burst as I’ve done before, however the moment your life force is gone if the person has not yet died you’re screwed. More so even if you’ve managed to defeat the person 1vs1 your life force will most likely be depleted and if you have to immediately move on to another fight you’ll be at a hideous disadvantage since you’ll have near 0 life force, making your class’ special ability completely useless and non existent.

Yes the DS has its uses, but saying that it can be used to last an extra few seconds is more harm than good so often. Because while you’re waiting for a cooldown so is your enemy, and unless you focus on a DS build you won’t be doing anything very useful while in there – on the other hand your enemy can chill out as well and just nuke you once you’re out of DS.

My only real issue with the DS is how COMPLETELY limited it is to only 1-2 specific builds completely centred around it. And unless you’re playing in a very specific way 1-2 of the four abilities it has is useless – while other classes have things which can help their build in play style in a variety of subtle or not so subtle ways.

For example I would give up the DS any day to have what the engineer has, able to have 4 extra abilities – or ability complimenters.

Well I was just quoting you when you said that it’s only useful when specced to it. It’s pretty useful when not specced to it. You’d be surprised how tough to beat a necro is when DS is used correctly.

And to add when I mean defensively. I don’t wait until DS completely depletes, for example when I get bullrushed->HB combo I just go in DS->Doom and come right out of it, wasting almost none. Then If I need it again I do the same. True when it all depletes you’re going to have a tougher time but when it’s full a necro is one hard class to beat.

I don’t really think it’s very useful, I just think it’s not useless.

On another note it’s just “useful” if you actually start the battle with life force, because if you don’t chances are you won’t be able to use it.

I like using conditions and pets, that’s the only way I enjoy playing the necro. And the DS is nearly useless for both those builds, because while in DS form I can’t command my minions, and with a condition build all the DS does for me is let me use a fairly weak AoE spell and a one target 1 second interrupt.

Guess we see it differently then, to me a stunbreak every 10 seconds or so with probably an added 1sec stun is pretty useful as long as there’s charge for it. As for the rest of the skills they are not that great and slow like people have been pointing out, but in its current state I don’t think DS is meant to be in it for a while but rather, go in defensively and save life force for the next burst/stun on you.

Krestfallen.8025

However, I think what we’re running into here is what I personally (emphasis on personally) consider to be the fundamental design “flaw” of Death Shroud. If you look at the way other class mechanics work, they’re all abilities that player can use in addition to all their other weapon skills, utility slots, elites, etc… whereas with us, using death shroud actually locks us out of all our other abilities.

This puts us in a position where unless you build specifically for DS, everytime you use it you’re being asked to make a trade off. The most extreme example of this is with Conditionmancers:— yes, DS can help them stay alive, but then they’re no longer able to stack conditions and thus lose the central focus of their particular playstyle (you’ll note that this, and complaints like this, are very common across the necro forum right now).

Any Gaurdian, regardless of spec, gets benefits from virtues. Any mesmer utilizes shatters. There’s no reason not to steal on any type of thief. No reason not to use adrenaline on a warrior, etc… etc… etc… (classes chosen at random as rhetorical devices only, this is not meant as any kind of particular balance comparison).

I’m not (and I don’t think anyone should be) arguing that DS needs to be some sort of “super” skill. But what it needs (only in my opinion, of course), is to be useful to all Necromancers regardless of how one spends their trait points.

This. Death Shroud on a mark/well build so far as I have tried, only useful as something to do while waiting out cool downs on your abilities that are actually good.

Overall, the ability would arguably be better not being a 2nd HP bar transformation, but rather just 4 skills all necromancers get at anytime that are tied to a resource bar that fills when things die.

I’d rather DS had 8-10 skills where you could only choose 4 to use at a time (would just be an extra slot under weapon skills). Could have a few CC ones, a few DD ones, a few bleeds/AEs, etc. I spec specifically for DS/power/crit/crit dmg and I can destroy mobs with 5k+ life blasts with everything built up.

I agree with Overkillengine, remove the transformation and keep it as abilities that can be used with life force as a resource would be wonderful. Also it’d be nice if we had a very small selection of skills to choose from, because even if I didn’t have to transform and could use those skills freely – I know that I would never use #1 or #2.

it’s funny i would rather trade 4 or 3 extra abilities on both my 80s for a huge extra hp bar.

ppl just dont know how worth it is. you can bait it for other people burst’s combo and after that is all your turn.

@Punny
It would be great to block off people’s burst to then have your turn – if necro’s had any burst.

Thing is I’m pretty fine with necros not having burst, after all we’re necromancers and not powerful giants of brute strength, to me it makes perfect sense that we are lesser than most when it comes to deal massive damage. However you’d imagine that since we lack brute power we’d make up for it in something else, but not so much.

-We suck as CC since we only have two 1sec fears with large cooldowns – compared to mesmer’s we’re pathetic at CC.
-We fall flat to what so many other condition focused builds in other classes can do since we have a very small diversity of conditions available to use – mainly just bleed, poison and cripple with a blind or weaken here and there.
-We obviously are lesser than most when it comes to direct damage.
-A minion build would be actually pretty nice if the AI was worth anything but it isn’t.

Now don’t get me wrong, the necro isn’t worthless, I almost strictly only play my necro – however as we currently are we just under perform compared to most. We can pull our weight, but only on very specific situations.

DS has the potential to be pretty awesome but due to the 4 lack luster horrible abilities we have available while in DS, that second HP bar is nearly useless.

Punny.9210:

it’s funny i would rather trade 4 or 3 extra abilities on both my 80s for a huge extra hp bar.

ppl just dont know how worth it is. you can bait it for other people burst’s combo and after that is all your turn.

I don’t think you know just how easy it is to blow death shroud away.

I think It would be nice if you could still go into Death Shroud mode like you can now
(working off of life force not health like it is now),

but you would no longer be forced to use the Death Shroud specific skills you get now,
which in my opinion are really lackluster.

Instead you would be able to add a Combo field of your choice to all your existing skills,
so that while you are in Death Shroud each skill now has a life force cost,
but it will drop the combo field of your choice,
which you could change at anytime in or out of Death Shroud.
(e.g. if you choose Poison, going into Death Shroud would cause your attacks to drop a poison field,
at an appropriate life force cost each time.)

I honestly think people are exaggerating how bad DS is. It’s not perfect and definitely needs some work but it has saved me and allowed me to win fights i would have normally lost without it time and time again.

One thing i see alot of necros do when i pvp against them is to just sit in DS and just let their life force drain out spamming Life blast and ultimately decreasing their dps.
I only use lifeblast two or three times to stack might before i turn off DS to conserve meter so i can build it back up. I try my best to stay above 50% DS at all times, its nice having that “okitten 1hbwarrior baddie alert” button. F1, 3, F1 and i dont have to burn spectral armor to survive.

I run D/WH and S/D on my necro. The DS #2 skill has a low CD, is a gap, closer inflicts bleeding and chill on the target. The fear we have isnt that great but fills the role i need when im pvping and need to keep a foe locked down for kills, denying stomps, ect. Even though its only one second its still crowd control.

And to whoever thinks we have a lack of CC we have the warhorn #4 skills, spectral grasp utility skill, flesh golem charge, dagger has a snare and ofc the DS fear.

It seems to me that we need more reliable forms of burst in terms of raw dps and condition dmg. We dont have access to stability without fully speccing into DS, we don’t have a quickness buff or any kind of steroid buff to help us apply conditions or just do raw dps faster.

If I had to make a personal tier list for the classes in this game it’d be A tier: guardian mesmer thief. B Tier Ranger Warrior necro and C tier: ele and engineer

Olkyr.4821:

But should it be ‘really great’ without speccing into it? DS is very good if you spec for it, but it is still a very nice ability to have without putting any points towards it. You won’t be using it offensively very much but it is amazing defensively. I don’t think it is really fair to make DS a super ability just by virtue of having it and not needing to build around it.

You’re doing something wrong if you’re not using it offensively. If you have decent power, life blast hits like a nuke hit.

here how i play on my necro dagger with full set of crit – dmg / Ds

my dmg are similar to the my melee guardian so far but then again

ppl who suck at being melee are not gonna like it. just like Gaurdians who play scepter