Guild Wars 2

This is a sPvP thread

Alright so I’ve been playing dagger main hand for the last two weeks with marauder amulet. I’m really torn on it; on the one hand, its boon corruption, healing, and LF generation are great! On the other hand, its range sucks hard, and there’s a reason it’s not meta. The LF generation from the autoattack is great… except for the fact that necro can’t just blindly autoattack. I only get to use it on downed bodies. So here’s some suggestions for dagger buffs, not all of them should be implemented together:

1. Change dagger autoattack to 300 range. This alone would make it a much more competitive option
2. Add lifesteal to autoattack and dagger 2. This seems like a no-brainer considering it fits with the overall “necrotic” theme of the dagger itself. Dagger 2’s damage should be lifesteal instead.
3. Add either chill or some high amount of vulnerability to Dagger 3, like 8 stacks for 10 seconds.

That’s it! Dagger’s autoattack needs to be revisited most, it’s almost unusable in sPvP and its melee range doesn’t even make sense with dagger 2 and 3 being 600 range.

I dont think chill is the right condition for mainhand dagger and vulnerability you can get from offhand focus (though i admit focus isnt in a good postion ether), so i can only say no to your 3. point.

But i agree that mainhand dagger needs some love.

I have to agree that Dagger is a bit underpowered, this is true in all game modes.

Ele dagger has 300 range because is a magical whip, Necro dagger just physical and themed after cerimonial daggers… dagger #2 and #3 are more like spells, this is why they have range.
Option 3 is just extremely OP.
You should use the axe if you want range and vulnerability. (NOTE: before 2014 dagger was able to hit only 1 enemy and axe range was 600 until 2015, axe was meant to be a ranged melee weapon).
Also, if you want to fight in melee you need some toughness, necro helas are not that great.

Anyway…
Since daggers are related to blood skills and traits the second option can be brainless but is ok.
It can be added to necrotic stab (2nd attach of the chain) since seems underpowered compared to the other two (multiplicators of the chain are: .9/.7/1.2) or just at the end of the chain.

There is also the option to just speed up the chain (as Anet has done to thief’s weapons), maybe by a 10% (-.2 seconds to take away from 2nd or 3rd attack).

I think that a bit of vulnerability can be added to skill #3 (Dark Pact) since it is like a curse.

This is a bit offtopic, but I think that Anet should add some LF generation to dagger #4… maybe just allow the skill to bounce to the caster (to give him LF) if there is no aviable enemy target to bounce to.

skill 3 is cool and all. corrupts and an immob can spell doom to someone out of cleanses and is primed for a burst.

skill 2 is kinda meh and I think it is about time it got to be redesigned to something that makes sense like a burst skill instead of wannabe ghastly claws but worse.

The auto attack from dagger damage just doesn’t scare off people in melee anymore and potentially gets you killed if you stick in melee range for too long even if it produces a good chunk of life force. I think necro dagger autoattack deserve the thief dagger autoattack treatment; make it faster and more damaging and maybe add a boon removal to it like the mesmer’s sword. now the dagger auto can actually scare people from engaging in melee for too long if they didnt cc you to hell and back yet.

whatever the case, I would only put on dagger for some funziez but never touch it for anything serious

Chill will be way to strong on dagger. Maybe 0.3-0.5 cripple, but still might be to strong.
maybe 0.5 weakness?! or poison… dunno. if they add condition thy will need to lower the damage. very hard to balance this one.
Greater range make no sense, maybe the last attack can be 150 range, but not more then that.
Stealing small amount of hp on one of the attacks is also a good idea instead of the condition. something like 100ish hp every 2 sec. to much?! dunno… hard task that one

Ive been trying myself to figure out what AN has been thinking with the dagger mainhand changes. It’s as if they wanted a condition hybrid weapon, but gave nothing to the auto attack to promote its use over scepter. Or they just like making us hurt ourselves with majority of our best skills.

There is a playstyle for that, but too many self applied conditions starts to wear against the idea of us having shroud and the extra base hp since we dont have the invulnerabilities and blocks of other professions. I do play with a condition corruption playstyle but want it to be about balancing/transferring the damage (not enough ways to transfer imo), rather than help the opponent to kill you faster.

That said, the dagger auto should have had something. A bleed or a 1/2-1 second chill would have been acceptable. I would use sigil of ice if the cooldown weren’t so long. (should be 1 second chill on a 5 sec cooldown imo). Either way, as others above have said, compared to skills from other professions like mesmers, dagger is still lacking and I feel the bleed application was a step in the wrong direction at current.