Guild Wars 2

Reasoning:
I think my idea here is actually pretty nice. Dark Path is possibly the most awkward skill to use in many scenarios. It takes a long time to cast, and the hand it sends out is slow and unreliable. On top of this, the Necromancer is fairly short on mobility (Warhorn, Wurm, Spectral Walk, and sort of Dark Path), and the lack of mobility hold necros back in many playstyles.
The Change: Make Dark Path work like Ride the Lightning.
This would be quite powerful. It works with the trait Path of Midnight, and it indirectly benefits from Foot in the Grave (stunbreak) as a “Get off me!” tool. This also more or less fixes the awkwardness of using Dark Path, and makes it a powerful mobility tool that all necromancers have access to.
The Draws:
Once, Ride the Lightning had a 15 second cooldown. However, it also had 1500 range and elementalists had an entire elite devoted to running away, along with a teleport utility without a cast time. Still, a reasonable draw may be to increase the recharge of Dark Path to 20 seconds.

Please tell me what you think!

This already exists, sorta. Lupi in Arah has a Necro themed RTL.

I would say no. Here’s why. You can immobilize an ele and their RTL won’t go anywhere. It can also be dodged or avoided, where as dark path tracks the target, even when they port around.

It does have a slow cast time though. I wish that were improved so it felt more fluid to cast it.

I miss the times when Dark Path would continue to chase an enemy target as long as the Necro was still in 1200 range of the target regardless of how long the projectile itself traveled. Now it just goes poof after traveling 1200 range.

Put it back as a ground targeted teleport. Can they reflect on what happen to us when it changed or are we in a good place like guardians? I tough we were opposite both in performance and design I must be blind.

When I said like RTL, I meant like RTL, immobilize weakness and instant cast.

Dark path was fantastic when it kept going as long as you were in range, since it made it actually powerful for chasing people down.

Now, if someone is disengaging it’s effective range is quite limited. It would be nice if the projectile was faster.

I completely agree with this idea, they wouldn’t have to implement a new animation, it would be a very awesome looking skill, and would give us some mobility.

Also, Roe I disagree with that being a reason not to change this, if anything that is another reason this would be balanced because it would have counterplay and would synergize well with Shrouded Removal. I mean come on you can’t tell me that huge lupi animation on your necro wouldn’t make you feel like a bad kitten.

I’d prefer it to be ground targeted.

I would prefer it to work like the guardian’s flashing blade except with a cast time
the cast time stays otherwise i feel like it would too powerful.
I think making it similar to rtl would also work

zapv.8051:

I completely agree with this idea, they wouldn’t have to implement a new animation, it would be a very awesome looking skill, and would give us some mobility.

Also, Roe I disagree with that being a reason not to change this, if anything that is another reason this would be balanced because it would have counterplay and would synergize well with Shrouded Removal. I mean come on you can’t tell me that huge lupi animation on your necro wouldn’t make you feel like a bad kitten.

How would it synergize with shrouded removal? You’re already in DS when you’re casting it. Plus no, I don’t want it to have a huge animation. I want it to be as discreet as it is now.

Roe.3679:

zapv.8051:

I completely agree with this idea, they wouldn’t have to implement a new animation, it would be a very awesome looking skill, and would give us some mobility.

Also, Roe I disagree with that being a reason not to change this, if anything that is another reason this would be balanced because it would have counterplay and would synergize well with Shrouded Removal. I mean come on you can’t tell me that huge lupi animation on your necro wouldn’t make you feel like a bad kitten.

How would it synergize with shrouded removal? You’re already in DS when you’re casting it. Plus no, I don’t want it to have a huge animation. I want it to be as discreet as it is now.

If you got immobilized you could go into DS and use this skill to get away from the incoming burst.

zapv.8051:

Roe.3679:

zapv.8051:

I completely agree with this idea, they wouldn’t have to implement a new animation, it would be a very awesome looking skill, and would give us some mobility.

Also, Roe I disagree with that being a reason not to change this, if anything that is another reason this would be balanced because it would have counterplay and would synergize well with Shrouded Removal. I mean come on you can’t tell me that huge lupi animation on your necro wouldn’t make you feel like a bad kitten.

How would it synergize with shrouded removal? You’re already in DS when you’re casting it. Plus no, I don’t want it to have a huge animation. I want it to be as discreet as it is now.

If you got immobilized you could go into DS and use this skill to get away from the incoming burst.

Then it would need to be instant cast, which would be a huge buff, which would probably result in a huge cooldown compared to the 15 second one now.

I like this idea, and I dislike this idea.

The idea of a ghost chasing down the enemy sounds fun. But it doesn’t seem very necro-y.

Maybe in our elite specialization, Dark Path can turn into that. Something like a Spectre specialization. When I think of ghosts, I think of spirit things chasing me at high speed. That would work better than on a necro.

DP should be a ground teleport like ele/mesmer blink. Since they nerfed fitg and we end up getting pinballed around again its worth revisiting for balance. I’d be ok with a cooldown increase.

Dark Path is absolutely fine with its current setup. The only changes I’d ever see to it are shortening cast time and making it travel over terrain better.