Guild Wars 2

Pretty much the title thread. DS should be hitting much much harder then it does. Even with life siphoning which I assume improves life transfer you can only stay in DS for so long. On top of that, DS has a built in limiter in that the less life you have on the bar, the less damage you do. So not only the longer you are in it the less damage you do as it drains, but with things attacking you get even less time. So the end result this should get a big buff to damage, projectile speed, and the cast time.

Is the class broken? No, and the way it is the class is serviceable and playable and most importantly very enjoyable. But thus far after playing most of the classes to 30+ this is the only class that has no real burst capability. At all. Can it outlast and eventually kill pretty much anything? Sure, but it is kinda embarrassing to be wailing on something and seeing the supposedly underpowered elementalist burst down the same mob in half the time. Heck our DPS can be so bad sometimes that I feel like I kill more stuff from the downed position then I do on my feet. Heck we even got a TRAIT for it!

If any of our mechanics could and should give us that utility and ability to burst, it is our DS mechanic. Built in limiters and built in nerfs for trying to spam it would keep it from being “OP”.

Roziel.5720:

Pretty much the title thread. DS should be hitting much much harder then it does. Even with life siphoning which I assume improves life transfer you can only stay in DS for so long. On top of that, DS has a built in limiter in that the less life you have on the bar, the less damage you do. So not only the longer you are in it the less damage you do as it drains, but with things attacking you get even less time. So the end result this should get a big buff to damage, projectile speed, and the cast time.

Is the class broken? No, and the way it is the class is serviceable and playable and most importantly very enjoyable. But thus far after playing most of the classes to 30+ this is the only class that has no real burst capability. At all. Can it outlast and eventually kill pretty much anything? Sure, but it is kinda embarrassing to be wailing on something and seeing the supposedly underpowered elementalist burst down the same mob in half the time. Heck our DPS can be so bad sometimes that I feel like I kill more stuff from the downed position then I do on my feet. Heck we even got a TRAIT for it!

If any of our mechanics could and should give us that utility and ability to burst, it is our DS mechanic. Built in limiters and built in nerfs for trying to spam it would keep it from being “OP”.

And it hit in the apropriate spec. In power spec you can hit 1.5~2k without crit with your 1st DS Skill, and until 3k~4k with crit, besides the 4th skill give you a great AoE damage. The problem i see in use DS in an offensive way is that you are giving up of part of your best deffensive source.

I’ve hit life blast for 4450 and I was using the wrong runes. DS can do some damage.

I wouldnt mind having DS1 being changed a little, as of now I can out dps DS form with normal attacks, and only pop DS for perpetual fury, DS3 and DS4. I wouldnt want it to do more damage though, as others have stated, it is quite easy to get high crit damage within it. Perhaps some condition infliction, or say, some damage based on the necros condition damage for how many conditions are on the enemy. Really needs to be reworked for condition necros than power right now.

I have had life blast crited for 6k and I only had 10 points in the death shroud line and was not really going for high damage hits with life blast.

I do think that death shrouds automatic degeneration rate is a little high considering how long it takes to build it up. You are basicaly forced to get the trait that causes death shroud to degenerate 25 percent slower if you want ds to last any longer than 15-20 seconds and thats without even taking any damage from anything.

I rather see a faster cast time than more damage. The cast time is really really long.

Rizach.4852:

I rather see a faster cast time than more damage. The cast time is really really long.

+1. That would improve the overall DPS of DS1.

Ascii.9726:

My thoughts on deathshroud skills:

Life Blast Hits pretty hard as it is, someone did suggest scaling damage with Life Force amount rather then it dropping off at 50% or less LF. Maybe a tad decrease on its channel time.
Dark Path The teleport and effect should be instant, not that extremely slow moving skill that’s easily blockable/ LoS breakable.
Doom No change really needed, maybe 1s Fear duration increase but who plays necro for fear?
Life Transfer Totally broken, Power Precision Crit Damage build i can hit upwards of 20k+ on a full channel to enemies in WvW, also it being a non-target moving AoE its almost always guaranteed to hit people.

Most people forget Death Shroud is as much of an offensive mechanic then defensive. Its base health amount is around 18k and can go up to 24k with the Soul Reaping tree. Thats 18k free HP on top of our already highest HP pool in game.

Just remember every 1% LF you gain from skills, or kills is +240 HP instantly, as a passive.

Hmm, didn’t know that life blast hit so hard if you focused on power/crit. With all my gear/weapons being power/crit and my trinkets being crit/condition I still don’t hit very hard with DS. But then I’m still leveling up, so 80 is probably different. (Hit 45 last night)

I still say that it should hit faster then, with such a slow moving pojectile and a slow cast time it just doesn’t seem that great. But I could be doing it wrong as I stated. I’ll try moving more gear to power/crit.

As for the life transfer that is basically our hardest hitting attack. It is also why I say the DS should be our burst. According to the tooltip it basically is meant to extend our time in DS, or originally was. Currently even when I have 10 plus mobs around me it barely increases my life pool at all. Is that a problem? Not if it is hitting as hard as you claim. Since it is already on a extended cooldown even with it’s cooldown trait along with the requirement of being in DS I would say it has its balance. No way to check cooldowns on DS skills until you go back into DS. So if you go back to early you either waste DS or have to wait for it’s DS’s own cooldown when you leave it.

If it really is hitting so hard at 80 then leave #1 damage alone, but please make it hit harder. #2 should be insatant as has been said. #3 should have more bang for our buck so either last longer or be an aoe (kinda like the warlock fear ala WoW). #4 is probably the only skill that is fine as is, especially since you need to really build to it hurting and some of us are building to it healing our party-members more then killing mobs. But in the end, the DS should be us visibally powering up. That currently really is not happening.

I think you’re using DS incorrectly for damage. There is no reason to stay in DS past the fury duration as you said, having less LF means less DS 1 damage. The sooner you get out of it, the sooner you can get back in and gain fury again. Reduced CD on DS also helps a lot.

DS is already great in Power builds and not that bad in Condition ones either.
I think that adding Bleed to Life Blast might be a better idea than upping the raw damage.

I am a hybrid necro, thus I am trying to balance some power with a decent load of condition damage. I would greatly appreciate DS1 to be based on the weapon equipped going into Shroud. For example, if a conditionmancer goes into DS, then scepter attack 1 would have some influence over DS1 and apply conditions (poison/bleed). If I go into DS with a staff, axe or dagger equipped, it would also change the DS attack 1; which woudl also include range changes. It would make DS much more interesting and viable for the different builds. Also, if the 1 attack of that weapon added LF, then so be it, you stay in DS longer etc. It would be a good trade -off and not OP (of course that is my opinion).

Only thing I would like to see is slight change to the #1 skill. The chunk it chews out of LF with each volley is pretty steep. I can get roughly 4 volleys off before the damage goes to kitten. the turn around decrease to damage is pretty harsh as well.

Easiest way I’ve seen to negate it though is to switch back out at around 60% so you can build quickly back again.

I like our DS as is, apart from #1 doing a little underwhelming damage after the 5 sec of fury wears off. Whether that’s because of the long cast time, or scaling, I don’t know.
I’m playing with a slight mix of stats in PvE, with berserker jewelry and knight armor + weapons for ~70% crit damage, 52% crit chance and just over 2000 Power, and I hit with Life Blast anywhere between 2000-6000 (depending on crits/non-crits & vulnerability stacks).
There have been higher numbers for me, but that’s with either a lot of might stacks from other party members or on targets that have some mechanic that make them take more damage (such as the crystal entities in Arah Jotun path).

One thing I’ve noticed when grouping with other Necromancers is that they don’t seem to realize just how versatile DS is. In some cases you can use it offensively for more damage (either by stacking vulnerability or by just popping in for 5 sec and bursting with the fury buff), and other times you can use it for the extra HP bar.
For instance, on Lupicus in Arah I pretty much only use DS defensively in phase 2 and 3, unless I also have other cooldowns to fall back on in emergencies, but in phase 1 I use it to blast away for extra burst + vulnerability stacking.

For the most part, however, I just cycle in DS between my weapon swap cycles in my Dagger/Dagger + Axe/Dagger power PvE spec for the fury buff and 3x Life Blast or 1x Life Transfer, then back out. For the most part I stay at 80-100%, and if I get focused hard or mess up, I have an extra health bar to fall back on.

Life transfer does rediculous damage, but I do think life blast could be bumped up a little, 4500 crits is the highest I’ve seen in spvp. If specced into full power/crit/crit damage, I would expect 5500-6000 the sweet spot.

Gryph.8237:

I am a hybrid necro, thus I am trying to balance some power with a decent load of condition damage. I would greatly appreciate DS1 to be based on the weapon equipped going into Shroud. For example, if a conditionmancer goes into DS, then scepter attack 1 would have some influence over DS1 and apply conditions (poison/bleed). If I go into DS with a staff, axe or dagger equipped, it would also change the DS attack 1; which woudl also include range changes. It would make DS much more interesting and viable for the different builds. Also, if the 1 attack of that weapon added LF, then so be it, you stay in DS longer etc. It would be a good trade -off and not OP (of course that is my opinion).

I love this idea. Would be so cool if DS1 was affected by your current weapon attack. With scepter giving it a condition damage component, maybe staff giving it an aoe or dagger reducing range, adding speed and damage etc.

That would increase the whole flavor of DS by several orders of magnitude.

Aside from fixing the bugged skills (Plague signet), I would be very satisfied if they did the following (top 5):

1. Allowed DS attack 1 to continue to stack conditions, or an effect dependent on the weapon you had equipped. That would spice DS up a bit and make it more useful for whatever build your running.

2. Allowed us to see the conditions on us while in DS. Boom, hit DS, get focused and have no clue what is going on with regards to conditions on me.

3. Allowed us to use skills 7-9 while in DS. Not sure how it would work with an elite, but why not skill 0 as well. Combined with request/wish 2, we could perhaps push the conditions on us, to another. (not sure about granting us heal in DS.)

4. switch some of the trait skills around to better allow conditionmancers to be condtionmancers and crit/power builds to do their job without having skills of no use to them. (I am not talking a complete re-work here, just a slight bit of maintenance.)

5. and the final wish, would be to move the trait allowing us to gain stability in DS out of the grandmaster line and into an earlier slot (20 Skill Point trait perhaps). Keep it at 3 seconds, but not make us have to go ALL the way into the trait to gain a modest ability at best.

a PS request: Do something else besides the jagged horrors. It is just useless and embarrassing. Plus, I have to change builds sometimes because of that stupid jagged horror pulling mobs (Does not happen now that I have gone hybrid).

Gryph.8237:

Aside from fixing the bugged skills (Plague signet), I would be very satisfied if they did the following (top 5):

1. Allowed DS attack 1 to continue to stack conditions, or an effect dependent on the weapon you had equipped. That would spice DS up a bit and make it more useful for whatever build your running.

2. Allowed us to see the conditions on us while in DS. Boom, hit DS, get focused and have no clue what is going on with regards to conditions on me.

3. Allowed us to use skills 7-9 while in DS. Not sure how it would work with an elite, but why not skill 0 as well. Combined with request/wish 2, we could perhaps push the conditions on us, to another. (not sure about granting us heal in DS.)

4. switch some of the trait skills around to better allow conditionmancers to be condtionmancers and crit/power builds to do their job without having skills of no use to them. (I am not talking a complete re-work here, just a slight bit of maintenance.)

5. and the final wish, would be to move the trait allowing us to gain stability in DS out of the grandmaster line and into an earlier slot (20 Skill Point trait perhaps). Keep it at 3 seconds, but not make us have to go ALL the way into the trait to gain a modest ability at best.

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a PS request: Do something else besides the jagged horrors. It is just useless and embarrassing. Plus, I have to change builds sometimes because of that stupid jagged horror pulling mobs (Does not happen now that I have gone hybrid).

What does the rest of the necro community think about these suggestions?

Ascii.9726:

My thoughts on deathshroud skills:

Life Blast Hits pretty hard as it is, someone did suggest scaling damage with Life Force amount rather then it dropping off at 50% or less LF. Maybe a tad decrease on its channel time.
Dark Path The teleport and effect should be instant, not that extremely slow moving skill that’s easily blockable/ LoS breakable.
Doom No change really needed, maybe 1s Fear duration increase but who plays necro for fear?
Life Transfer Totally broken, Power Precision Crit Damage build i can hit upwards of 20k+ on a full channel to enemies in WvW, also it being a non-target moving AoE its almost always guaranteed to hit people.

Most people forget Death Shroud is as much of an offensive mechanic then defensive. Its base health amount is around 18k and can go up to 24k with the Soul Reaping tree. Thats 18k free HP on top of our already highest HP pool in game.

Just remember every 1% LF you gain from skills, or kills is +240 HP instantly, as a passive.

Lol if life siphon was hitting people for 20k you would see half the enemys around you die every time you life siphon bro.

I think Ascii was referring to the total possible damage against 5 targets in a scenario filled with several nearby enemies (hence him mentioning “in wvw”).

And yes, 4k per target is entirely realistic regardless of your spec.

4k is impressive? Let’s look at Mesmer(clone explosions), Wars(axe f1), and Thieves (backstab) critting over 10k.

I went 100% power spec and death shroud from 100% life force and still hardly doing near the damage my other 100% power spec builds from wars, mesmers, thieves, and even elementalists.

Punny.9210:

it’s 4k per tick lol so total it’s over 10k

my dagger 1# is around 1500 – 3000
Ds 1# is around the same
Ds 4# is around 2000 – 4000 per tick

with Hp pool this class has + another Hp bar from Ds
i usually take any class down before they take me

So you have leveled three different classes to 80 and still not figured out that the damage number you see for channeled skills that keeps getting larger and larger with each tick is NOT the damage of that tick but the total damage done with that skill?

Yes, I definitely think 4k per target is impressive. It’s a relatively short cooldown that (against 5 targets) negates the depletion rate of life force. I don’t think the necromancer was ever designed as an “omgz burstdmges” character. Any damage we deal in death shroud is effectively damage we deal while immune to receiving any.

You can easily make a build that focuses on it to hit around 3-4k and over 5k on certain enemies under 50% health. I don’t think it really needs any more damage.

I don’t think it needs to hit harder I just want a faster cast. It comes out so ridiculously slow I actually get antsy and it ends not getting off. I literally have to wait around while it takes time to cast.

And then the cooldown between casts is ridiculous. It feels like one shot every 3-4 seconds.

You’d be surprised with the synergy ArenaNet had in mind when they gave us the 5 second fury buff. Life Blast has an approximate cast time of 1.5 seconds. This means you’ll get exactly 3 blasts off before fury ends. Likewise, Life Transfer has an approximate 5 second channel time- It fits almost perfectly with 15 point curses trait.

Death Shroud damage and duration scales with vitality.

It does not reduce the percent-based decay over time, but damage done to you and the “cost” of abilities is fixed.

I am also fairly sure life blast scales with vitality as well as power.

Whoah buddy, what is this thread? Stop fomenting discussion!

Don’t you know DS is already OP and you need to L2P!

I find that part of my problem is that i forget DS is even charging.

I cycle between checking my skills, health and the damage numbers, but forget that green bar in the corner.

As for Furious Demise, is there some kind of internal cooldown or can i maintain a near constant fury by traiting DS for 5 sec cooldown?

no cool down on furious demise, in theory you can use the 5second DS with some boon duration enhance ment and have perm fury, even when your not in combat juse pop in and out of DS and you can build it up.

Seems almost as if we are better off flipfloping DS than staying in there then, unless we need the “timeout”.

digiowl.9620:

Seems almost as if we are better off flipfloping DS than staying in there then, unless we need the “timeout”.

Absolutely. It’s kind of like playing a bunker ele. You want to get into water, and try to flip out again asap so you can get back into sooner so you can have a higher rate of bonuses.