Guild Wars 2

Death Magic, as of now, is probably the least used specialization out of all. While others also have some traits that beg for a rework (like Unholy Martyr in Blood Magic that’s way too niche for GM), DM is absolutely plagued by those.

I’ll list few observations of mine:

• The specialization is heavily centred around swapping in and out of Shroud/staying in Shroud for extended periods of time, moreso than Soul Reaping – All such traits lose quite a bit of value with Scourge and none is particulary powerful as of now.

• Soul Reaping, Blood Magic both provide better defense than Death Magic – the defensive specialization.

• Unholy Sanctuary, a GM trait that was mediocre even right after Specialization update is hillariously weak with Scourge – it’s basically a second Regeneration for 7s. It’s only reediming factor would be the interaction between Desert Shroud and Dhuumfire, but that’s digging deep for any purpose.

• Soul Comprehension – Yes, this infamous trait. On multiple occassions necro players have expressed that it’s basically like not having a master minor. We know that you’ve added it for “the theme”, but it’s so incredibly weak and niche that you got to scratch your head when reading it.

• We have three (!) separate traits for one utility type – minions. I get that many people love idea of running around with five or six permanent body shields, but that’s neither a big identity of Necromancer in GW2 nor is effective. Minions we use tend to be utility-heavy (in what direction I believe all Minions should move to be useful) and apart from non-competitive full MM builds (and Rise!) Necromancers may use 1-2 at time, not 6.
  Please, baseline some of those traits’ aspects and combine 3 into 1 Grandmaster, freeing up the space.

• Death Magic has no real “selling point”. The only real reason to run it was/is in PvE for Death Nova. The traitline won’t give some major defenses, it doesn’t really have any exciting traits and, apart from minions, has little synergy within itself. It’s far too heavy on Minions which don’t work well in GW2.

I would welcome a critical look at the specialization for the upcoming balance patch & expansion.

I run death magic on power necro for the condi cleanse, extra power, and as a safeguard against spike damage.

I don’t run minions and don’t know any serious players that do, but some people enjoy it. Let them have their traits, even if you never see them in high performance content.

Hesacon.8735:

I run death magic on power necro for the condi cleanse, extra power, and as a safeguard against spike damage.

I don’t run minions and don’t know any serious players that do, but some people enjoy it. Let them have their traits, even if you never see them in high performance content.

I’m taking this personal
I like the MM traits and use minions a lot lately. They are great in open/solo PvE and fractals. Wouldn’t play them in PvP or raids, tho.

can we get refund from the expac?
I might want to get my money back, if the next balance patch fks us over again.

Core problem of Death Magic has a name: THE REAPER

Because the two lines overlap so much in what they do (damage reduction + healing through shroud), one was axed. And it wasn’t the reaper.

This was a bad call – core necro ended up being screwed and Death Magic vastly subpar. Talking mostly Blighter’s boon and how op it gets with Spite line, vs Unholy Sanctuary and how it sucks, regardless what you try to synergize it with.

Blighter’s boon needs a nerfbat to it’s healing values, or changing to healing per boon type applied vs current healing per boon stack (so getting 2 stacks of might will trigger one heal, not two).

Unholy Sanctuary should have an initial bust heal (5k health) when triggered via otherwise lethal blow. If it just saved you from death, then here’s 5k health for starters and from there the usual regen until you leave shroud.
Since the auto-shroud on death has build in Icd it’s already pretty balanced.
Also the base health regen value ticking every second could use a boost. This is a grandmaster trait for pete’s sake…

Corrupter’s fervor – very good grandmaster, this is how it’s done. You can have 20% condi damage reduction and 300 tougness 24/7 if you build right. Especially that condi damage reduction is sweet as necro in shroud is very prone to condi bombs and needs passive defenses vs that.

Speaking of which i think one zone that is very underdeveloped, and should be part of necro’s playstyle is condi transfers of allies. Atm it’s more of a curiosity then a real feature of our kit, but that could be one thing death magic could cater to.

There are several features one could introduce in Death Magic to make it worthwhile:

• a trait to block having condies pulled by you cleansed by teammates. Maybe you want to transfer them to an enemy, feed them to your well of power and use for consume conditions? In such a case you would want to have the final say what to with them, not warrior’s shout or ranger’s signet.

• a trait to reduce condi damage when pulling conditions to self. Corrupter’s Fervor is a perfect fit, like for example – gain 5 stack when you pull a condition off an ally.

• a trait that allows more heals to go through shroud. Things like blood fiend, parasitic contagion, regeneration are waiting in line to get some love when you’re shrouded. That is very much Death Magic’s theme.

• traits with some cc hate. A trait that reduces duration of hard cc on you would be very nice. Like 30% less hard cc duration.
  We all know necro’s aren’t about crazy amounts of stability, but they are the ones to eat every kitten cc there is from enemy team. Something to curb that would be diamonds.

• trait that raises effectiveness of weakness.
  We have revenants and their trait that reduces effectiveness of weakness on them.
  Why not give necros one that makes it stronger, like let’s say 66% fumble chance and 66% lower endurance regeneration? Necromancer is all about condition manipulation and debilitating foes with conditions. Such super weakness would go along way vs crazy burst professions like thieves and warriors.

*not necessairly in Death Magic, but we could really use a trait to lower fear durations on us, since we’re supposed to be masters of fear, and thieves fearing us 2x with their steal is ridicilous.

My problem with Death Magic is that most traits are either too situational or too weak, while the line is also 33% taken up by redundant traits like the entire minion line. If Flesh of the Master could be made baseline and Necromantic Corruption/Death Nova be combined at the GM level, then that would open up two full trait slots for more ambiguous items that could fill out other roles for tanking/variety. Outside of that, my only personal large complaint in the traitline is that Unholy Sanctuary’s Healing Power scaling is tragic. Currently it’s a 130 baseline heal per second with a scalar of 0.12. That means that if you’re a support build looking for additional personal sustain/tankiness and you’re all in on Healing Power, you’re still only regaining ~300 HP/s. This is less than a Warrior’s Healing Signet when they have zero Healing Power, and this is a Grandmaster Trait we’re talking about. I would like to see them drop the base heal to around 100, but increase the Healing Power coefficient to around 0.38, this way Unholy Sanctuary healing is roughly equivalent to personal Soothing Mists when you’re in Shroud with ~1400 Healing Power.

Outside of this, I only have smaller complaints about the line:
Putrid Defense is too low of a % when compared to Shrouded Removal and considering its variance in uptime/downtime.

Reaper’s Protection has a high cooldown for a Master level counter-CC trait that uses the worst hard CC in the game on a class with the worst ways of dealing with hard CC trains, but it has potentially very respectable synergies when combined with Fear of Death and Terror. I would like to see a 40ish second CD on this, even if it means a small reduction on the Fear duration, if not just completely flip-turning this trait into something that gives Stability or something else that’s infintely more effective than the Fear.

Soul Comprehension.

ZeftheWicked.3076:

Snip.

I disagree with Blighter’s Boon needing a nerf and its synergy with Spite being a problem. Reaper and Death Magic both scale in different ways, with one scaling well from Power and the other scaling from Toughness/Healing Power. The problem is that while Reaper with Blighter’s Boon scales well with Power, Unholy Sanctuary scales awfully with Healing Power, so while they both fill different roles, one is simply terrible while the other is quite good.

It’s like putting a professional athlete next to a skinny college nerd. You wouldn’t tell the athlete to get fatter, you would tell the nerd to bulk up some more. You shouldn’t nerf something that isn’t even too strong because the competition is too weak. This is literally what happened to a small degree with Vital Persistence a month ago, and people lost their minds until ANet did us a solid and gave us back some of what was lost.

Reasons Bligher’s does need a nerfbat:

• a-net is very reluctant to boost heals through shroud without nerfing something in return.
• Blighter’s is not pure heal – it also generates life force. Sanctuary doesn’t.
• Sanctuary requires actual healing power investment. Bligher’s? Spam more boons!
• Nerf core trait for sake of one elite – all other elites and core builds suffer due to underpowered core spec!

Sure you want to have your cake and eat it – get better Unholy Sanctuary with no nerfs to bligher’s. But that’s not how it works – to make this omlet you need to break a few eggs!

And also core necro needs some more love – love that reaper’s should get less of, as they have their own reaper traitline already.

ZeftheWicked.3076:

Reasons Bligher’s does need a nerfbat:

• a-net is very reluctant to boost heals through shroud without nerfing something in return.
• Blighter’s is not pure heal – it also generates life force. Sanctuary doesn’t.
• Sanctuary requires actual healing power investment. Bligher’s? Spam more boons!
• Nerf core trait for sake of one elite – all other elites and core builds suffer due to underpowered core spec!

Sure you want to have your cake and eat it – get better Unholy Sanctuary with no nerfs to bligher’s. But that’s not how it works – to make this omlet you need to break a few eggs!

And also core necro needs some more love – love that reaper’s should get less of, as they have their own reaper traitline already.

How is that not how that works? Let’s say you buff US without nerfing BB and someone decides to take both. If someone decides to spec hard into Power and Healing Power to maximize their damage through Spite and Blighter’s Boon and to get the most out of Unholy Sanctuary, that means all 3 traitlines are locked in. You have no extra damage or sustain from Soul Reaping, none of the boon control of Curses, and none of the other sustain from Blood Magic. Plus if you’re deep into Healing Power and Power, then you’re lacking in Toughness, Vitality, Precision, and Ferocity, which means your damage is less than a typical Marauder Reaper while your raw healing is good, but your actual durability is low. Basically you do less damage and get focused out faster, but your small scale sustain is higher. Sounds like healthy tradeoffs to me!

Also I fail to see your logic. For one you’re forgetting that US also has the low health passive protection functionality. Blighter’s Boon requires the investment of Sigils, utility choices, single traits, and even an entire traitline to abuse, while US only requires a stat input. You’re saying nerf a core trait, but I’m not saying we should nerf US, I’m saying we should buff it by giving it better scaling and identity, at which point “core necro needs some more love” is exactly what we’re trying to do.

Problems:
1. Soul Comprehension is garbage.
2. Spending 3 traits on minions does not even make you good when you have a full bar of minions.
3. Many traits are passive, do very little, or both. Putrid Defense and Deadly Strength have no active effect or active play. Shrouded Removal is okay but does not have throughput.

Gold star to Corruptor’s Fervor and Reaper’s Protection, you guys are actually good traits. Beyond the Veil isn’t horrible either.

Fixes:
1. Beyond the Veil eats Soul Comprehension and becomes the new Master Minor.
2. Jam MM effects into one trait or baseline:
Minion damage and health increase baseline.
New trait; minions grant their master increased Toughness and explode when they die. Probably an Adept trait.
3. Add some active goodies to effects:
Putrid Defense creates a 4-second CPC with 40 second CD at your feet when you’re critically struck.
Delete Deadly Strength.
Buff Shrouded Removal to 2/3s or 1/2s.

This leaves you 2 Master Majors, a GM Minor, and a GM Major. Take this with salt, because it doesn’t actually matter, so long as they get something in there:
“When the number of conditions on you exceed the threshold, lay a Well of Power at your feet.” 5 conditions, 60 seconds
“Retaliation causes Bleeding. Beyond the Veil applies when you enter and leave Shroud, and also grants Retaliation.” 1 bleed 3 seconds, 1 retaliation 3 seconds
“Toughness and Protection reduce the damage you take from conditions.” 1%/100toughness, 15%
“Share boons, stunbreaks and condition clears you gain from entering Shroud with nearby allies.”

I agree that this is basically the t useless spec of the necro, the only thing it actually works with is a Rabid build for bursty condi dmg instead of vipers DPS oriented style, with it you can reach 2000 condi dmg on PvP, but this is literally the only time id ever use it.

Minions should be updated as well, like the Putrid explosion from the bone minions having the critical hit chance and ferocity of the minion.

For minion traits, I agree that some baselining/condensing is needed. I propose a new Grandmaster trait: “Minion master.”

Minions draw conditions from allies and transfer them to enemies they strike. Minions also explode in a toxic cloud on death. You gain Toughness for each Minion you control.

Health and damage from traits get baselined. Maybe have the effectiveness on those increases cut for baselining (say, 15% damage instead of 25%). I don’t think that’s necessary, but developers may see things differently than I do.

Regardless, though, Death Magic really needs some attention.

ZeftheWicked.3076:

Reasons Bligher’s does need a nerfbat:

• a-net is very reluctant to boost heals through shroud without nerfing something in return.
• Blighter’s is not pure heal – it also generates life force. Sanctuary doesn’t.
• Sanctuary requires actual healing power investment. Bligher’s? Spam more boons!
• Nerf core trait for sake of one elite – all other elites and core builds suffer due to underpowered core spec!

Sure you want to have your cake and eat it – get better Unholy Sanctuary with no nerfs to bligher’s. But that’s not how it works – to make this omlet you need to break a few eggs!

And also core necro needs some more love – love that reaper’s should get less of, as they have their own reaper traitline already.

You really want to nerf an already mediocre grandmaster trait that only halfway works with the spite line due to the severe lack of boon application? Seriously, the problem here is ALL in the deathmagic line.

A defensive, selfish grandmaster trait that scales with healingpower belongs into BLOODMAGIC, the traits that prolong the duration and heavily influence the duration you wanna be in shroud belong into SOUL REAPING.

Death Magic needs pure defensive feats, not strictly connected to shroud. It needs to get rid of the minion traits, these cost a lot of space and “power” they can give that traitline without even affecting 95% of the builds.

It needs a reliable and usefull “on stun” trait, n AOE fear on a 60s CD with 360 range does not work at all when you get stunned from long range. The other professions “on stun” traits always provide a reliable benefit, our fear has a very long cooldown, is unreliable and has too much counterplay in order to be of any use, the only reason people pick it is because the lack of reasonable options.

It also needs a reliable anti burst and anti CC mechanic of sorts.

Brujeria.7536:

ZeftheWicked.3076:

Reasons Bligher’s does need a nerfbat:

• a-net is very reluctant to boost heals through shroud without nerfing something in return.
• Blighter’s is not pure heal – it also generates life force. Sanctuary doesn’t.
• Sanctuary requires actual healing power investment. Bligher’s? Spam more boons!
• Nerf core trait for sake of one elite – all other elites and core builds suffer due to underpowered core spec!

Sure you want to have your cake and eat it – get better Unholy Sanctuary with no nerfs to bligher’s. But that’s not how it works – to make this omlet you need to break a few eggs!

And also core necro needs some more love – love that reaper’s should get less of, as they have their own reaper traitline already.

You really want to nerf an already mediocre grandmaster trait that only halfway works with the spite line due to the severe lack of boon application? Seriously, the problem here is ALL in the deathmagic line.

A defensive, selfish grandmaster trait that scales with healingpower belongs into BLOODMAGIC, the traits that prolong the duration and heavily influence the duration you wanna be in shroud belong into SOUL REAPING.

Death Magic needs pure defensive feats, not strictly connected to shroud. It needs to get rid of the minion traits, these cost a lot of space and “power” they can give that traitline without even affecting 95% of the builds.

It needs a reliable and usefull “on stun” trait, n AOE fear on a 60s CD with 360 range does not work at all when you get stunned from long range. The other professions “on stun” traits always provide a reliable benefit, our fear has a very long cooldown, is unreliable and has too much counterplay in order to be of any use, the only reason people pick it is because the lack of reasonable options.

It also needs a reliable anti burst and anti CC mechanic of sorts.

But death magic is also about pets.Shouldn’t it have loads of stuff for pets? I want pets to be awesome so we use them more and it could be fun in pve and pvp running around with a million pets.

As for healing related stuff:no please, i agree keep in blood magic traitline

Axl.8924:

Brujeria.7536:

ZeftheWicked.3076:

Reasons Bligher’s does need a nerfbat:

• a-net is very reluctant to boost heals through shroud without nerfing something in return.
• Blighter’s is not pure heal – it also generates life force. Sanctuary doesn’t.
• Sanctuary requires actual healing power investment. Bligher’s? Spam more boons!
• Nerf core trait for sake of one elite – all other elites and core builds suffer due to underpowered core spec!

Sure you want to have your cake and eat it – get better Unholy Sanctuary with no nerfs to bligher’s. But that’s not how it works – to make this omlet you need to break a few eggs!

And also core necro needs some more love – love that reaper’s should get less of, as they have their own reaper traitline already.

You really want to nerf an already mediocre grandmaster trait that only halfway works with the spite line due to the severe lack of boon application? Seriously, the problem here is ALL in the deathmagic line.

A defensive, selfish grandmaster trait that scales with healingpower belongs into BLOODMAGIC, the traits that prolong the duration and heavily influence the duration you wanna be in shroud belong into SOUL REAPING.

Death Magic needs pure defensive feats, not strictly connected to shroud. It needs to get rid of the minion traits, these cost a lot of space and “power” they can give that traitline without even affecting 95% of the builds.

It needs a reliable and usefull “on stun” trait, n AOE fear on a 60s CD with 360 range does not work at all when you get stunned from long range. The other professions “on stun” traits always provide a reliable benefit, our fear has a very long cooldown, is unreliable and has too much counterplay in order to be of any use, the only reason people pick it is because the lack of reasonable options.

It also needs a reliable anti burst and anti CC mechanic of sorts.

But death magic is also about pets.Shouldn’t it have loads of stuff for pets? I want pets to be awesome so we use them more and it could be fun in pve and pvp running around with a million pets.

As for healing related stuff:no please, i agree keep in blood magic traitline

Well “pets” for the necro is really just a set of utility skills, much like spirits, spirit weapons or something similar. It has no connection to the shroud or weapon skills. Using 1/3 of a trait line just for that is too much, a pure minion master is stuff for an elite spec dedicated to it.

Brujeria.7536:

Axl.8924:

Brujeria.7536:

ZeftheWicked.3076:

Reasons Bligher’s does need a nerfbat:

• a-net is very reluctant to boost heals through shroud without nerfing something in return.
• Blighter’s is not pure heal – it also generates life force. Sanctuary doesn’t.
• Sanctuary requires actual healing power investment. Bligher’s? Spam more boons!
• Nerf core trait for sake of one elite – all other elites and core builds suffer due to underpowered core spec!

Sure you want to have your cake and eat it – get better Unholy Sanctuary with no nerfs to bligher’s. But that’s not how it works – to make this omlet you need to break a few eggs!

And also core necro needs some more love – love that reaper’s should get less of, as they have their own reaper traitline already.

You really want to nerf an already mediocre grandmaster trait that only halfway works with the spite line due to the severe lack of boon application? Seriously, the problem here is ALL in the deathmagic line.

A defensive, selfish grandmaster trait that scales with healingpower belongs into BLOODMAGIC, the traits that prolong the duration and heavily influence the duration you wanna be in shroud belong into SOUL REAPING.

Death Magic needs pure defensive feats, not strictly connected to shroud. It needs to get rid of the minion traits, these cost a lot of space and “power” they can give that traitline without even affecting 95% of the builds.

It needs a reliable and usefull “on stun” trait, n AOE fear on a 60s CD with 360 range does not work at all when you get stunned from long range. The other professions “on stun” traits always provide a reliable benefit, our fear has a very long cooldown, is unreliable and has too much counterplay in order to be of any use, the only reason people pick it is because the lack of reasonable options.

It also needs a reliable anti burst and anti CC mechanic of sorts.

But death magic is also about pets.Shouldn’t it have loads of stuff for pets? I want pets to be awesome so we use them more and it could be fun in pve and pvp running around with a million pets.

As for healing related stuff:no please, i agree keep in blood magic traitline

Well “pets” for the necro is really just a set of utility skills, much like spirits, spirit weapons or something similar. It has no connection to the shroud or weapon skills. Using 1/3 of a trait line just for that is too much, a pure minion master is stuff for an elite spec dedicated to it.

I hate it when people call minions ‘pets’. Thats not what they are, and that’s not how they operate. Given how much necro gives up for these ‘pets’ they should be stronger than they are, but they can’t be buffed because everyone that doesn’t like necro thinks they are OP.

The problem with death magic is you are forced to take tanky traits, mixed in with minion traits, and half the traits are pure garbage. Half the traits only effect conditions, or apply conditions as well.

Brujeria.7536:

Well “pets” for the necro is really just a set of utility skills, much like spirits, spirit weapons or something similar. It has no connection to the shroud or weapon skills. Using 1/3 of a trait line just for that is too much, a pure minion master is stuff for an elite spec dedicated to it.

A pure minion master should be doable with core necro. Doable and efficient.
That’s the most obvious thing of this class and a good part of it’s appeal for new players and veterans of the previous game. It’s also iconic and the first thing most people think about when you say “necromancer”.
But our minions are so lame that NPC necro (Traherne and Marjory, for exemple) are using overpowered/bigger versions of them to be cool…

The problem with Death Magic is that minions need a rework. Right now, the only minion that feels good is the Blood Field, in that it has a clear and unique purpose. The other minions are just passive damage with a weak on-use effect.

I’ve always believed that they made a mistake making minions a permanent summon; they should work more like they did in GW1 with steadily degenerating health but very powerful effects and solid damage. The shout ability “Rise!” is much closer to how minions should function.

To reply to some criticism to my post:

• Blood magic is the last traitline to be selfish. Almost all of our party play is there (Transfusion, Vampiric Presence & Rituals, Unholy Martyr, Life from Death).

• Putting shroud traits in one line only is extremely bad design. As to why, just look at warrior and his “Defense line or die in seconds” reality. Perfect way to make already boring class reach new levels of boredom and unflexibility.

• Death magic having passive defenses is good. In shroud you can’t use active ones to help you. Passives or enjoy being cc ragdolled and getting condibombed with no way to retalliate. It’s the quality of these passives that needs work (reaper’s protection is indeed to easy to get around).

• Blighter’s boon is op like it or not. If you go spite, that thing heals you in shroud better then whole blood magic line put together, especially when target drops below 50% hp. And that’s without having to rely on Healing Power investment.

Other big issue here is how good and sustainy reaper shroud is vs crappy Death Shroud. If core necro DS would get a proper rework to give him more unique sustain, then I wouldn’t have to ask for reaper trait nerfs and core traitline buffs to bring the two bit closer to eachother after pressing F1.

ZeftheWicked.3076:

To reply to some criticism to my post:

• Blood magic is the last traitline to be selfish. Almost all of our party play is there (Transfusion, Vampiric Presence & Rituals, Unholy Martyr, Life from Death).

• Putting shroud traits in one line only is extremely bad design. As to why, just look at warrior and his “Defense line or die in seconds” reality. Perfect way to make already boring class reach new levels of boredom and unflexibility.

• Death magic having passive defenses is good. In shroud you can’t use active ones to help you. Passives or enjoy being cc ragdolled and getting condibombed with no way to retalliate. It’s the quality of these passives that needs work (reaper’s protection is indeed to easy to get around).

• Blighter’s boon is op like it or not. If you go spite, that thing heals you in shroud better then whole blood magic line put together, especially when target drops below 50% hp. And that’s without having to rely on Healing Power investment.

Other big issue here is how good and sustainy reaper shroud is vs crappy Death Shroud. If core necro DS would get a proper rework to give him more unique sustain, then I wouldn’t have to ask for reaper trait nerfs and core traitline buffs to bring the two bit closer to eachother after pressing F1.

The difference is that Blighter’s Boon is entirely selfish, while the effects of Blood Magic benefit other players. And again, Blighter’s Boon does require an investment from the player like Blood Magic does, but instead of needing to devote stats to Healing Power, you need to devote Sigils, Runes, Utility choices, Trait choices, and even an entire Trait Line just to get your value out of Blighter’s Boon. It’s a different kind of investment, but it’s the same effect. Plus Blighter’s Boon requires certain in game checks to be met to become extra powerful, such as opponents being sub-50% or your target being Chilled, while Blood Magic is always consistent.

Sarrs.4831:

3. Many traits are passive, do very little, or both. Putrid Defense and Deadly Strength have no active effect or active play. Shrouded Removal is okay but does not have throughput.

Gold star to Corruptor’s Fervor and Reaper’s Protection, you guys are actually good traits. Beyond the Veil isn’t horrible either.

What are you talking about? Procs are the worst trait designs out there. They trivialize fights so much with unpredictability and high-impact with no tells.

The others may not be super strong, but their design is way better than most of the others.

If they just made minions tankier baseline and got rid of FoTM, made PD not depend on poison but apply in shroud, put in some kind of LF trait, buffed US’s base heal, made it scale better with healing power and got rid of the passive proc on it, and did a few numbers tweaks to a few traits like DS, the line would be fine.

ZeftheWicked.3076:

Core problem of Death Magic has a name: THE REAPER

Death magic was terrible even long before HoT (and the reaper) came out. In fact it was a terrible traitline since the beginning of gw2.

Heck i still remember kitten traits like reanimator… a trait that was later replaced (and put into death nova) with soul comprehension, which is terrible as well.

ZeftheWicked.3076:

To reply to some criticism to my post:

• Blood magic is the last traitline to be selfish. Almost all of our party play is there (Transfusion, Vampiric Presence & Rituals, Unholy Martyr, Life from Death).

Blood magic is supposed to be a big part of out sustain line. Yet the grandmasters have no effect on ourself. Transfusion does not help base necro or reaper. Same for unholy martyr. Vampiric rituals only works if you use wells, which leaves no grandmaster option if you dont want to play wells to actually benefit yourself.

ZeftheWicked.3076:

• Putting shroud traits in one line only is extremely bad design. As to why, just look at warrior and his “Defense line or die in seconds” reality. Perfect way to make already boring class reach new levels of boredom and unflexibility.

I agree with this, but there is way too much shroud synergy in death magic. The condi remove only works in shroud which is wasted most of the time, unholy sanctuary and deathly strenght promote shroud camping, which is the bigger “theme” of soul reaping.

ZeftheWicked.3076:

• Death magic having passive defenses is good. In shroud you can’t use active ones to help you. Passives or enjoy being cc ragdolled and getting condibombed with no way to retalliate. It’s the quality of these passives that needs work (reaper’s protection is indeed to easy to get around).

The problem is the design of shroud, it needs active means of stability and condi remove, probably attached to traits or redesigns. The better the weapon, utility and shroudskills are defensive wise, the better deathmagic will get on top if it’s done right.

ZeftheWicked.3076:

• Blighter’s boon is op like it or not. If you go spite, that thing heals you in shroud better then whole blood magic line put together, especially when target drops below 50% hp. And that’s without having to rely on Healing Power investment.

You compare elite traitlines with normal ones. Elite traitlines, just like elite skills are supposed to be stronger than base traitlines. Especially as reaper is a meele centric concept, this is where sustain matters the most across all classes. Blighter’s boon is not OP. It requires heavy investments, if anything at all it is UP compared to similar traitlines that focus on support as it is heavy limited by your ability to hit targets, where as other classes get the sustain passive or trough more “reliable” means.

The lack of decent base necro sustain is another big point we lack, but honestly this has nothing to do with reaper, death magic, or blighters boon.

When was the last time you saw an ele build that ran earth?

Every class has a defensive traitline which is never taken.

Tobias.8632:

When was the last time you saw an ele build that ran earth?

Every class has a defensive traitline which is never taken.

Earth is a very solid condi spec and it’ll be a core component of Fire/Earth/Weaver builds with PoF. It’s also great for invincible Water/Earth/Tempest Auramancers.

Tobias.8632:

When was the last time you saw an ele build that ran earth?

Every class has a defensive traitline which is never taken.

You see Earth taken all the time in WvW. Diamond Skin and Stone Heart both see tons of use there.

ZeftheWicked.3076:

To reply to some criticism to my post:

• Blood magic is the last traitline to be selfish. Almost all of our party play is there (Transfusion, Vampiric Presence & Rituals, Unholy Martyr, Life from Death).

• Putting shroud traits in one line only is extremely bad design. As to why, just look at warrior and his “Defense line or die in seconds” reality. Perfect way to make already boring class reach new levels of boredom and unflexibility.

• Death magic having passive defenses is good. In shroud you can’t use active ones to help you. Passives or enjoy being cc ragdolled and getting condibombed with no way to retalliate. It’s the quality of these passives that needs work (reaper’s protection is indeed to easy to get around).

• Blighter’s boon is op like it or not. If you go spite, that thing heals you in shroud better then whole blood magic line put together, especially when target drops below 50% hp. And that’s without having to rely on Healing Power investment.

Other big issue here is how good and sustainy reaper shroud is vs crappy Death Shroud. If core necro DS would get a proper rework to give him more unique sustain, then I wouldn’t have to ask for reaper trait nerfs and core traitline buffs to bring the two bit closer to eachother after pressing F1.

I don´t get it, how is 192 (0,03 scaling)healing per boon without healingpower op ?
I would rather buff, than nerf it.

Tobias.8632:

When was the last time you saw an ele build that ran earth?

Every class has a defensive traitline which is never taken.

It’s taken, but not as much anymore since the buffs to arcane which are used for things like kiting flak (lower cd on sheild).

DeceiverX.8361:

What are you talking about? Procs are the worst trait designs out there. They trivialize fights so much with unpredictability and high-impact with no tells.

The others may not be super strong, but their design is way better than most of the others.

I’m afraid I disagree.

A tree that isn’t on the map because it’s filled with garbage isn’t a choice. Build strategy is based around making choices between trees.

If Death Magic is so garbage that it isn’t taken, it doesn’t matter how much you say “it’s well designed because it doesn’t have procs!”, it’s still not taken. It’s not a choice. It’s not good for the build strategy layer.

I would rather have a Death Magic tree that is designed like absolute garbage, but presents a meaningful alternative to Soul Reaping as a defensive line, than an immaculately designed Death Magic tree which never sees play.