Guild Wars 2

The UI for death shroud is improved so you can see your health and conditions and boons. You can now be healed in death shroud.

Blood Magic
Deathly Invigoration – Heal in an area and cure a condition when you leave death shroud.
((Healing: 1,302 (1.0)?
Radius: 240)) [It is buffed majorly, to be more like elementalist.]
[Cooldown: 10s.]

Curses
Furious Demise – Gain fury for 4 seconds when entering and leaving Death Shroud.

Weakening Shroud – Cast Enfeebling Blood when entering death shroud.

Death Magic
Death Shiver – Apply chill for 3 seconds every 3 seconds to nearby enemies while in Death Shroud.

Shrouded Removal – Convert a condition into a boon when you enter and leave Death Shroud.
[Cooldown: 5 seconds.]

Soul Reaping
Near to Death – Death Shroud recharges 50% faster.

Speed of Shadows – Move 50% faster while in death shroud.

Vital Persistence – Life force drains 33% slower while in death shroud.

Path of Midnight – All death shroud skills recharge 25% faster.

Spite
Spiteful Spirit – Gain retaliation for 4 seconds when entering and leaving Death Shroud.

This is to improve “Life Blast.”

Soul Reaping
Unyielding Blast – Life Blast pierces and causes a random offensive condition.
Confusion (4s)
Burn (3s.)
Bleed (8s.)

Spite
Reaper’s Might – Life Blast and Plague Blast grant a random defensive boon for 10 seconds.
(Protection 3s.)
(Regeneration 4s.)
(Vigor 5s.)

I feel that these are very strong and would need toned down, but the ideas for it would be similar, it would make more play-styles for the necromancer, and remember. Even though they all look powerful, you cannot have all of them. We don’t have a 30/30/30/30/30 spec

Are these actual patch notes or just the fevered dreams of a madman?

I would remove the things that allow things on enter and leave, and keep them at just enter or just leave, otherwise the 5s CD death shroud would be far too strong as a boon tool.

I feel like the chill might be a bit too strong, and the heal seems like it would be very strong. I know elementalists have a similar ability, but I’m not sure that it would translate as well for us when we can go out of DS every 5 seconds.

Bhawb.7408:

I would remove the things that allow things on enter and leave, and keep them at just enter or just leave, otherwise the 5s CD death shroud would be far too strong as a boon tool.

I feel like the chill might be a bit too strong, and the heal seems like it would be very strong. I know elementalists have a similar ability, but I’m not sure that it would translate as well for us when we can go out of DS every 5 seconds.

I think ele can get stance swaps at 6-7 seconds with max arcane attunement? Or am I wrong

Schroedingercat.7065:

Bhawb.7408:

I would remove the things that allow things on enter and leave, and keep them at just enter or just leave, otherwise the 5s CD death shroud would be far too strong as a boon tool.

I feel like the chill might be a bit too strong, and the heal seems like it would be very strong. I know elementalists have a similar ability, but I’m not sure that it would translate as well for us when we can go out of DS every 5 seconds.

I think ele can get stance swaps at 6-7 seconds with max arcane attunement? Or am I wrong

Yep, Elementalist can get a cleansing wave every 5-10 seconds depending on there spec, and they’re class does a bit more damage. However necromancers have more conditions. However necromancers lack there mobility.

Deathly invigoration: not sure about the cond-remove and the numbers; thats too much, imo. but it should definitely heal more than it does now

Furious Demise, Shrouded removal, spiteful spirit: so ppl can have perma retaliation and fury when they double-tap DS and dont even need ‘near to death’ for that? thats OP. especially perma-retaliation is really lame.

Death Shiver: tweak the numbers so it doesnt give perma-chill.

Speed of Shadows: way too much.

Reapers Might/unyielding blast: not sure about the particular boons/conditions you chose, but its an interesting idea. i dont really want to lose ‘vuln/might on lifeblast’ tho.

Weakening Shroud: the internal cooldown should be lowered to 10 or completely removed.

RashanDale.3609:

Deathly invigoration: not sure about the cond-remove and the numbers. but it should definitely heal more than it does now
Furious Demise, Shrouded removal, spiteful spirit: so ppl can have perma retaliation and fury when they double-tap DS and dont even need ‘near to death’ for that? thats OP. especially perma-retaliation is kinda lame.

Death Shiver: tweak the numbers so it doesnt give perma-chill

Speed of Shadows: way too much.

Reapers Might/unyielding blast: not sure about the particular boons/conditions you chose, but its an interesting idea. but i wouldnt want to lose ‘vuln/might on lifeblast’ either.

Weakening Shroud: the internal cooldown should be lowered to 10 or completely removed.

Actually, Weakening Shroud could be changed to:

Weakening Blast – Life Blast bounces twice and causes vulnerability.
((Of course, this would almost completely negative the piercing the other trait causes, however it could be a play-style change as well, where the piercing trait is more for condition necromancers and the Blast Trait for power necromancers.))

Remember, it may be OP – but with the way Death Shroud traits are spread around you could not pick up all of them really, “Perma Retaliation.” may be a little OP, but Necromancers are an attrition class with some of the lowest damage in the game, and with the “boon hate” mechanic coming into play. It may balance out. On a Guardian which has so many more defensive boons and the ability to gap close and help allies, it was pretty OP, especially when they got 4-5 stacks of it.

Lowered chill amount, fury amount, retaliation amount.

Bhawb.7408:

I would remove the things that allow things on enter and leave, and keep them at just enter or just leave, otherwise the 5s CD death shroud would be far too strong as a boon tool.

One thing to keep in mind about the 5s CD DS is that if you’re trying to maximise boons from entering/leaving as soon as possible it means you’ve gone 30 points into a tree that buffs DS and are not doing much inside it.

If you’re spending some time inside DS blasting away then you’ll have less uptime on these boons.

As far as Perma-retaliation goes, it’s already achievable if leveraging Axe #3 (3 seconds of retaliation per target hit, 15 second base cooldown. If untraited and hitting the maximum 5 targets it will give perma-retaliation)

I know, I use that build right now, it also gives permanent fury. With what he is saying right now though, you can do it without even traiting. The traiting would just allow a 1.3k Heal, 2 condition cleanses per 5 seconds, one of which turns into a boon.

DS builds also still allow for pretty high DPS (you can keep 60% crit chance with 30% crit damage in sPvP) on top of all the defensive boons.

Edit: actually you would have 3 condition cleanses, two of them turning into boons, every 5 seconds.

Can we also let death shroud inherit agony resistance and not take double damage from all conditions while we are at it? :p

Schroedingercat.7065:

Can we also let death shroud inherit agony resistance and not take double damage from all conditions while we are at it? :p

Some relevant threads. (Check the latter half of both threads. General conclusion reached was that Death Shroud takes condition damage normally. I don’t know about agony, but I’d presume it works similarly, though it may use the % health of your actual life pool rather than a % of death shroud.)

Daecollo.9578:

Actually, Weakening Shroud could be changed to:

Weakening Blast – Life Blast bounces twice and causes vulnerability.
((Of course, this would almost completely negative the piercing the other trait causes, however it could be a play-style change as well, where the piercing trait is more for condition necromancers and the Blast Trait for power necromancers.))

Lowered chill amount, fury amount, retaliation amount.

weakening shroud is fine, except for the unnecessary 15 secs recharge. no need to change that.

thats still perma-chill, without any cond.-duration…

And Furious demise, how it is currently in the game, is perfectly fine.

Let’s see. My wishlist…

Spite- Spite has some really awful traits. Pretty much every trait aside from Grandmasters is terrible.

Parasitic Bond— This trait is completely useless since healing after an enemy is down is not going to help in a number of circumstances. Thus, it should give health every time you hit an enemy with less than 25% life, including fatal blows. (5 second cooldown to make it pretty useless as it is a first level trait, but better than it is currently).

Siphoned Power— Also grant 10% life force when triggered. I mean really, getting hit under 25% health should have some more dramatic effects.

Death’s Embrace— Also increase the range of downed skills. If you’re going to cater to a trait to take specifically for going down, might as well go all out.

Chill of Death— One change only. The skill should be casted without delay. Why the heck would I want to interrupt my attack chain just to cast this mediocre spell?

Training of the Master— All minion secondary skills are also 10% more effective. Which doesn’t really mean much except the skeleton nuke.

Signet Power— Add a stack of fury too. With those stupidly long cooldowns, it’s only fair.

Reaper’s Might— All Death shroud skills grant might. This one doesn’t really suck, but life blast is slooowww…

Spiteful Marks— Also 5% duration increase

Curses The best tree IMO. It has everything a necro could ever want. If they left it the same, I wouldn’t mind.

Reaper’s Precision— 40% on crit to proc 1% life force

Death Magic-- Another strong tree with many powerful traits. No changes necessary but if I were to wish…

Reanimator— 15 second cooldown. At least it’d be funny.

Flesh of the Master— Minions also gain your agony resist and 10% of your toughness. Honestly, there needs to be a way for ALL pets to gain agony resist and not just necros.

Blood Magic: Mostly decent, just that the siphoning skills need to be better.

Soul Reaping: A good tree but it comes at the expense of others. For this reason, the skills need to be somewhat stronger since building this tree up sacrifices a lot else.

Unyielding blast: Also increases rate of fire of Life Blast. Also applies to plague blast

Decaying Swarm: Casts the actual Locust Swarm Skill and not this piece of dung. Suddenly a godly escape skill is born.

Foot in the Grave: Death Shroud also breaks stuns when entering. (10 second cooldown) Oh come on, it’s a grandmaster skill. >.>

a dreampatch post, though a lot of the “in AND out” swaps could be balanced with internal cooldowns.

Flumek.9043:

a dreampatch post, though a lot of the “in AND out” swaps could be balanced with internal cooldowns.

Its not like they are overpowered though, compared to what other classes recieve.

However your right, adding a 10 second internal CD to some would be good, especially to the cleansing ones.

1 condition removal + 2 conditions to boons every 5 seconds is definitely OP.

Bhawb.7408:

1 condition removal + 2 conditions to boons every 5 seconds is definitely OP.

Yes, thanks for stating what I said in the beginning. :P

ArchonWing.9480:

Let’s see. My wishlist…

Siphoned Power— Also grant 10% life force when triggered. I mean really, getting hit under 25% health should have some more dramatic effects.

Foot in the Grave: Death Shroud also breaks stuns when entering. (10 second cooldown) Oh come on, it’s a grandmaster skill.

I kind of agree that Siphoned Power could stand to be more dramatic. I’m not sure adding a defensive measure is the right way to go though. I’d rather just see a greater intensity in the might stacks. (2 stacks per hit instead of just 1? The base might duration is fairly low.)

Having Death Shroud break stun would be great, but that cooldown has to be at least 30 seconds, if not higher. 10 second cooldown translates to literally every time death shroud is up (You didn’t take Near to Death) and would possibly be the shortest recharge of any stunbreak in the game. There’s about two stun breaking utilities that have recharges less than 30 seconds, which was my guideline for the bare minimum recharge time.

ArchonWing.9480:

Chill of Death— One change only. The skill should be casted without delay. Why the heck would I want to interrupt my attack chain just to cast this mediocre spell?

Decaying Swarm: Casts the actual Locust Swarm Skill and not this piece of dung. Suddenly a godly escape skill is born.

These skills already do these things. Chill of death doesn’t interrupt your casting / attack chains, and decaying swarm grants swiftness.

Softspoken.2410:

ArchonWing.9480:

Let’s see. My wishlist…

Siphoned Power— Also grant 10% life force when triggered. I mean really, getting hit under 25% health should have some more dramatic effects.

Foot in the Grave: Death Shroud also breaks stuns when entering. (10 second cooldown) Oh come on, it’s a grandmaster skill.

I kind of agree that Siphoned Power could stand to be more dramatic. I’m not sure adding a defensive measure is the right way to go though. I’d rather just see a greater intensity in the might stacks. (2 stacks per hit instead of just 1? The base might duration is fairly low.)

Having Death Shroud break stun would be great, but that cooldown has to be at least 30 seconds, if not higher. 10 second cooldown translates to literally every time death shroud is up (You didn’t take Near to Death) and would possibly be the shortest recharge of any stunbreak in the game. There’s about two stun breaking utilities that have recharges less than 30 seconds, which was my guideline for the bare minimum recharge time.

ArchonWing.9480:

Chill of Death— One change only. The skill should be casted without delay. Why the heck would I want to interrupt my attack chain just to cast this mediocre spell?

Decaying Swarm: Casts the actual Locust Swarm Skill and not this piece of dung. Suddenly a godly escape skill is born.

These skills already do these things. Chill of death doesn’t interrupt your casting / attack chains, and decaying swarm grants swiftness.

Thanks for the notes. Guess my memory was off when testing them. And yes, the cooldown times were just sorta arbitrary.

Hm, decaying swarm does give swiftness now? I used to use it when I could proc it off any attack while in DS, and it didn’t give swiftness back then. Good to see that fixed, but I still hate those low self HP triggers (like siphoned power, which I really dislike because of it).

The only DS trait I really disagree with is weakening shroud, it’s a great trait, but why on earth does it have a 15 second CD and not a 10 second or no CD at all?

Because spammable permanent weakness and bleeds is too much. Even with the CD, its 66% weakness uptime.

Then reduce durations. It works fine as is for how I use DS, I just think on principal it is inconsistent with other ‘entering DS traits’

All it does is cast Enfeebling Blood on top of yourself, which is a separate ability. They could certainly reduce the durations and CDs equally, but I think as is is best. This way, they can have long duration bleed/weakness, which means you don’t need to spam DS to keep it up. It certainly wouldn’t break anything either way, though.

As a side note, decaying swarm seems to interfere with Last Gasp. I assume they share the same cooldown?

What I don’t like about Life Blast is that the less Life Force you have, the less damage Life Blast will do. So how about a trait for Life Blast to be equivalent of a 100% Life Force Life Blast no matter how much Life Force you have?

ArchonWing.9480:

As a side note, decaying swarm seems to interfere with Last Gasp. I assume they share the same cooldown?

Interesting. I’ll have to look into that.

Rok.5260:

What I don’t like about Life Blast is that the less Life Force you have, the less damage Life Blast will do. So how about a trait for Life Blast to be equivalent of a 100% Life Force Life Blast no matter how much Life Force you have?

Life blast’s base damage only changes based on if you have greater or less than 50% life force remaining. So any time from 51% – 100%, you’re firing at full power!

Softspoken.2410:

ArchonWing.9480:

As a side note, decaying swarm seems to interfere with Last Gasp. I assume they share the same cooldown?

Interesting. I’ll have to look into that.

Rok.5260:

What I don’t like about Life Blast is that the less Life Force you have, the less damage Life Blast will do. So how about a trait for Life Blast to be equivalent of a 100% Life Force Life Blast no matter how much Life Force you have?

Life blast’s base damage only changes based on if you have greater or less than 50% life force remaining. So any time from 51% – 100%, you’re firing at full power!

So ya how about a trait for Life Blast to keep firing at full power even below 50%? Would really help a lot in PvE and PvP.

ArchonWing.9480:

Let’s see. My wishlist…

Spite- Spite has some really awful traits. Pretty much every trait aside from Grandmasters is terrible.

Parasitic Bond— This trait is completely useless since healing after an enemy is down is not going to help in a number of circumstances. Thus, it should give health every time you hit an enemy with less than 25% life, including fatal blows. (5 second cooldown to make it pretty useless as it is a first level trait, but better than it is currently).

Really now? It grants you nearly 1k Health at lvl 80 and is affected by Healing Power. In dungeons with a lot of trash, that is invaluable. Seems pretty sweet for a 5 point Trait.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Parasitic_Bond

They really need to do something about axe training make it master trait remove dmg part add some aoe/cleave.

Fix focus trait its been broken for such a long time now.

add 5# skill to death shroud that sacrifice your real life for lifeforce

Oglaf.1074:

Really now? It grants you nearly 1k Health at lvl 80 and is affected by Healing Power. In dungeons with a lot of trash, that is invaluable. Seems pretty sweet for a 5 point Trait.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Parasitic_Bond

its still entirely useless in boss fights without adds and pvp fights. you would rather something that helps you kill your enemy in the first place than a trait that helps you when you’ve already won.
while i would prefer a parasitic bond that works more like its gw1-version, archonwings idea is interesting too.

Come now, its a five point trait. Not only that, but the first five point trait you get. Had it been the 15 or 25 trait, I might’ve agreed. But at 5 points it is a freebie, and a kitten good freebie at that.

Oglaf.1074:

ArchonWing.9480:

Let’s see. My wishlist…

Spite- Spite has some really awful traits. Pretty much every trait aside from Grandmasters is terrible.

Parasitic Bond— This trait is completely useless since healing after an enemy is down is not going to help in a number of circumstances. Thus, it should give health every time you hit an enemy with less than 25% life, including fatal blows. (5 second cooldown to make it pretty useless as it is a first level trait, but better than it is currently).

Really now? It grants you nearly 1k Health at lvl 80 and is affected by Healing Power. In dungeons with a lot of trash, that is invaluable. Seems pretty sweet for a 5 point Trait.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Parasitic_Bond

Wow, it’s 1k life? I’ve still never seen it made a difference, mainly because you autoheal outside of combat anyways. And against a lot of trash, 1k health simply isn’t going to make the difference, unless you can kill them fast enough of which then the whole thing is moot anyways!

Still I understand the need for it to be weak since it’s a 5 point trait so given that any cooldown on it should be longer.

I also think traits that give advantage during combat more than once per foe tends t be more useful. Even the crappy reanimator can do that, and specced with protection of the horde at least gives you a tempoary 20 toughness, for example.

1k life before Healing Power. If you combine it with Sigil of Restoration, the results are pretty spectacular.

To even compare it to Reanimator is an insult. It is waaaay better a 5 point Trait than that piece of garbage.

Most dungeons have areas where you need to defend against loads of trash mobs. Even when I’m running in rare MF gear with the only defense being 20 in Blood and Death magic, I am consistently the longest person to last. Why? Because of 1k heals + full death shroud every 10 seconds. Literally, you can go into DS, wait for it to fully run out, and by the time its off CD it will be full again (note only in trash mob situations). That is pretty significant.

I’ve honestly never thought much about trash mobs when writing all of this though there are certainly things like the graveling and underwater fractals where this might be of use.