Guild Wars 2

I am trying to stay optimistic with the upcoming trait changes and what not. I know we only received minor buffs to power and really nothing for condi except MAYBE more survivability. However, when i was looking at the traits i noticed things like Spinal Shivers being unblockable and Signet of the Locust having a 30sec cooldown.

Sooo maybe just maaaayyybe, they did a good bit of “buffs” and balancing with our skills which is why are traits did not see a huge overhaul. Any thoughts?

They give us something. Protection when we exit from DS, a lot of heal when we hit a enemy under 25% hp, some good things. Some good try to balance our class.
But we need something like engi: a lot of total rework on our class, because there’s really a large amount of things that necro don’t have (mobility skills, stability, defensive skills like block or invulenrability and a lot of other things).
They can give us good things, but if we can’t obtain that things our live don’t change.
We speak frequently about spvp, but because it is a very good place to try our best and worst things.
We can deal good damage (lesser than other classes, but still good), we have a “2nd health bar”, a lot of fear skills and good condition damage, we can corrupt boons. And if you really want it we can have protection.
But we haven’t a way to evade damage, to flee from a enemy, to survive like all the other classes can do. Into a spvp fight frequently the team focus on the necromancer. That’s why it’s the easyest class to take down, because the necro haven’t a single defensive skill out of DS. And if you strip away DS from the necro you alsto steal he’s better dps source. And all the other classes can do everything we do but better and with lower risk than us.

And in PvE we’re barely useless, yes, but not because we don’t deal damage, because a necromancer can deal a good damage, but because we don’t give a single buff to the team, we haven’t a Blast Finisher easy to use and we can’t do good combos with other classes.

We’re a good class, you can find some very good and skilled necromancers in spvp that can kill you, but we’re always a step back the other classes. Expecially in PvE and sPvP.

But if you look to WvsWvsW we have a very good role: we’re the main dps power of the zerg!

We’ve still a role in this game and that’s what let us stay here. We’re only hoping for new things in pve and spvp. That’s all.

Necromancer is a good class and it well be in the futur. We have only to endure and wait for that great Specializzation that wait us in HoT!

Every time someone says that necro has a second healthbar a kitten dies.
Every. Single. Time.

Charblaze.6958:

Every time someone says that necro has a second healthbar a kitten dies.
Every. Single. Time.

I’m curious, what’s the preferred categorization of Death Shroud’s defensive capabilities then? It’s not like it’s a period of invulnerability, or extra dodges. It’s also not nothing, even if general consensus is that it’s not enough.

It is a period of invulnerability – no extra dodges, though.

My greatest concern right now is condition duration. Almost all builds counted on 20 – 30 % condition duration due to Spite investment as base.

It isn’t a period of “invulenrability”, it’s a period whyle you’re struck into a good dps state with no defence, no condi clear, no movement skills and that is our only way to survive.
That make me thing…. I’m sad…

I’m most concerned about condition builds personally… It’s what made me love Necro so much and I also consider it to require a bit more effort than power builds. Power spec is obviously more squishy so you need to make fewer mistakes but the over all damage dealing aspect doesn’t feel very complicated to me. Where as with a conditionmancer you need to know a good rotation to keep a constant stream of conditions on your target otherwise you won’t be much of a threat.

Not only that, Necro is supposed to be the condition class. I like to go with that theme. Soon enough we’ll just be the class that can cleanse every condition once and transfer a few times. Besides that we’re not going to have much in the way of application because our condition builds will suck compared to all the others…

None of this is finalized yet so I’m not entirely sure what will become of us. I’m just concerned that conditionmancer will be so weak it won’t be worth playing anymore. Not only that, I find it strange they would want to nerf us in that respect when you consider that we’re already one of the weaker condition professions.

I’m just very, very afraid for what these changes will do to us… I really don’t want to find myself not enjoying Necro anymore.

Softspoken.2410:

Charblaze.6958:

Every time someone says that necro has a second healthbar a kitten dies.
Every. Single. Time.

I’m curious, what’s the preferred categorization of Death Shroud’s defensive capabilities then? It’s not like it’s a period of invulnerability, or extra dodges. It’s also not nothing, even if general consensus is that it’s not enough.

A shield.

Softspoken.2410:

Charblaze.6958:

Every time someone says that necro has a second healthbar a kitten dies.
Every. Single. Time.

I’m curious, what’s the preferred categorization of Death Shroud’s defensive capabilities then? It’s not like it’s a period of invulnerability, or extra dodges. It’s also not nothing, even if general consensus is that it’s not enough.

Transformation Resource/Mana Shield. Kind of.

SpellOfIniquity.1780:

Necro is supposed to be the condition class.

That spot goes to engineer, necro is the boon/condition manipulation class but AoE boon generation and cleansing is off the charts compare to their counterparts, hell sometimes we are too busy taking hits to actually try to do the job and even we try we are too slow at doing it. Just for necro I want(probably need) a condition that negates boons while active a reverse version of resistance, I’m not sure where the community came with the condition meta it was always a boon+extra one.

Rym.1469:

Softspoken.2410:

Charblaze.6958:

Every time someone says that necro has a second healthbar a kitten dies.
Every. Single. Time.

I’m curious, what’s the preferred categorization of Death Shroud’s defensive capabilities then? It’s not like it’s a period of invulnerability, or extra dodges. It’s also not nothing, even if general consensus is that it’s not enough.

Transformation Resource/Mana Shield. Kind of.

It’s a green meat bag you punch it to get to the rotten bones…

It’s really just a reverse mana pool with attached cons.

Softspoken.2410:

Charblaze.6958:

Every time someone says that necro has a second healthbar a kitten dies.
Every. Single. Time.

I’m curious, what’s the preferred categorization of Death Shroud’s defensive capabilities then? It’s not like it’s a period of invulnerability, or extra dodges. It’s also not nothing, even if general consensus is that it’s not enough.

It isn’t a health bar because:

• Health bars are always full at start while life force is empty
• Health bars don’t drain over time.
• Health bars don’t prevent healing.

It isn’t an invulnerability because:

• You are still being hit by CC and conditions.
• It doesn’t scales with the number of enemies.

What’s the closest thing to death shroud?

• Life force drains like the downed bar.
• You are locked out of your skills and utilities as if you were downed.
• You can’t use your heal when you are downed.
• CC and conditions are effective against downed players.
• The downed state doesn’t scales with the number of opponents either.

So what is death shroud? Death shroud is a downed state.
You can use it only to buy time, hoping the situation turns in your favour, with little to no control on the outcome… exactly like when you are downed. Fun fact: death shroud was the necromancer’s downed state before being lazily promoted to profession mechanic during development.

The whole profession is balanced around the 2nd health bar idea, while we really have a glorified downed state, and it’s supposed to cover for the lack of invulnerability and mobility. How can you fix this mess without completely reworking death shroud?

Our profession mechanic is to enter and exit a downed state at will. Next time you are wondering why death shroud is so hated ask yourself “Do I enjoy being downed?”.

Charblaze.6958:

Softspoken.2410:

Charblaze.6958:

Every time someone says that necro has a second healthbar a kitten dies.
Every. Single. Time.

I’m curious, what’s the preferred categorization of Death Shroud’s defensive capabilities then? It’s not like it’s a period of invulnerability, or extra dodges. It’s also not nothing, even if general consensus is that it’s not enough.

It isn’t a health bar because:

• Health bars are always full at start while life force is empty
• Health bars don’t drain over time.
• Health bars don’t prevent healing.

It isn’t an invulnerability because:

• You are still being hit by CC and conditions.
• It doesn’t scales with the number of enemies.

What’s the closest thing to death shroud?

• Life force drains like the downed bar.
• You are locked out of your skills and utilities as if you were downed.
• You can’t use your heal when you are downed.
• CC and conditions are effective against downed players.
• The downed state doesn’t scales with the number of opponents either.

So what is death shroud? Death shroud is a downed state.
You can use it only to buy time, hoping the situation turns in your favour, with little to no control on the outcome… exactly like when you are downed. Fun fact: death shroud was the necromancer’s downed state before being lazily promoted to profession mechanic during development.

The whole profession is balanced around the 2nd health bar idea, while we really have a glorified downed state, and it’s supposed to cover for the lack of invulnerability and mobility. How can you fix this mess without completely reworking death shroud?

Our profession mechanic is to enter and exit a downed state at will. Next time you are wondering why death shroud is so hated ask yourself “Do I enjoy being downed?”.

Huh… You know I never thought of it this way but it is entirely true.

SpellOfIniquity.1780:

Charblaze.6958:

Softspoken.2410:

Charblaze.6958:

Every time someone says that necro has a second healthbar a kitten dies.
Every. Single. Time.

I’m curious, what’s the preferred categorization of Death Shroud’s defensive capabilities then? It’s not like it’s a period of invulnerability, or extra dodges. It’s also not nothing, even if general consensus is that it’s not enough.

It isn’t a health bar because:

• Health bars are always full at start while life force is empty
• Health bars don’t drain over time.
• Health bars don’t prevent healing.

It isn’t an invulnerability because:

• You are still being hit by CC and conditions.
• It doesn’t scales with the number of enemies.

What’s the closest thing to death shroud?

• Life force drains like the downed bar.
• You are locked out of your skills and utilities as if you were downed.
• You can’t use your heal when you are downed.
• CC and conditions are effective against downed players.
• The downed state doesn’t scales with the number of opponents either.

So what is death shroud? Death shroud is a downed state.
You can use it only to buy time, hoping the situation turns in your favour, with little to no control on the outcome… exactly like when you are downed. Fun fact: death shroud was the necromancer’s downed state before being lazily promoted to profession mechanic during development.

The whole profession is balanced around the 2nd health bar idea, while we really have a glorified downed state, and it’s supposed to cover for the lack of invulnerability and mobility. How can you fix this mess without completely reworking death shroud?

Our profession mechanic is to enter and exit a downed state at will. Next time you are wondering why death shroud is so hated ask yourself “Do I enjoy being downed?”.

Huh… You know I never thought of it this way but it is entirely true.

+1

Answers to “How would you categorize Death Shroud” so far include:

A shield
Transformation Resource/Mana Shield.
Reversed mana pool with drawbacks
Downed State

Mana shield seems to be the best short-hand thus far. I’ve been looking for a good, quick way to explain it to someone (listing all the caveats of the current system can take a while) so it’s nice to have as a jumping-off point.

Softspoken.2410:

Answers to “How would you categorize Death Shroud” so far include:

A shield
Transformation Resource/Mana Shield.
Reversed mana pool with drawbacks
Downed State

Mana shield seems to be the best short-hand thus far. I’ve been looking for a good, quick way to explain it to someone (listing all the caveats of the current system can take a while) so it’s nice to have as a jumping-off point.

I think we can erase mana shield and reverse mana pool, all games I played that have one don’t carry the limitations of DS downed state seems to fit perfectly, we used to have it as downstate I believe as well UI and everything.

wasn’t ds and downstate for necro the same or very similiar or something, isn’t that why a whole bunch of bugs effected our downstate foreverererere and our hp was messed up etc.

I do mean beta.

It did previously use the Downed State UI. But how you enter and exit Death Shroud is very different from downed state, as is the power level of a necromancer currently in Death Shroud. Plus, ‘downed state’ isn’t nearly as universal as Mana Shield, so it’s less effective in terms of quickly establishing common ground.

I may use “Transformation Resource”, since “mana” implies a few things about the game in general that aren’t really true (there are no Necro skills that specifically use mana/life force, for example, only skills that generate them).

Charblaze.6958:

Softspoken.2410:

Charblaze.6958:

Every time someone says that necro has a second healthbar a kitten dies.
Every. Single. Time.

I’m curious, what’s the preferred categorization of Death Shroud’s defensive capabilities then? It’s not like it’s a period of invulnerability, or extra dodges. It’s also not nothing, even if general consensus is that it’s not enough.

It isn’t a health bar because:

• Health bars are always full at start while life force is empty
• Health bars don’t drain over time.
• Health bars don’t prevent healing.

It isn’t an invulnerability because:

• You are still being hit by CC and conditions.
• It doesn’t scales with the number of enemies.

What’s the closest thing to death shroud?

• Life force drains like the downed bar.
• You are locked out of your skills and utilities as if you were downed.
• You can’t use your heal when you are downed.
• CC and conditions are effective against downed players.
• The downed state doesn’t scales with the number of opponents either.

So what is death shroud? Death shroud is a downed state.
You can use it only to buy time, hoping the situation turns in your favour, with little to no control on the outcome… exactly like when you are downed. Fun fact: death shroud was the necromancer’s downed state before being lazily promoted to profession mechanic during development.

The whole profession is balanced around the 2nd health bar idea, while we really have a glorified downed state, and it’s supposed to cover for the lack of invulnerability and mobility. How can you fix this mess without completely reworking death shroud?

Our profession mechanic is to enter and exit a downed state at will. Next time you are wondering why death shroud is so hated ask yourself “Do I enjoy being downed?”.

So sad but true.

Charblaze.6958:

Softspoken.2410:

Charblaze.6958:

Every time someone says that necro has a second healthbar a kitten dies.
Every. Single. Time.

I’m curious, what’s the preferred categorization of Death Shroud’s defensive capabilities then? It’s not like it’s a period of invulnerability, or extra dodges. It’s also not nothing, even if general consensus is that it’s not enough.

It isn’t a health bar because:

• Health bars are always full at start while life force is empty
• Health bars don’t drain over time.
• Health bars don’t prevent healing.

It isn’t an invulnerability because:

• You are still being hit by CC and conditions.
• It doesn’t scales with the number of enemies.

What’s the closest thing to death shroud?

• Life force drains like the downed bar.
• You are locked out of your skills and utilities as if you were downed.
• You can’t use your heal when you are downed.
• CC and conditions are effective against downed players.
• The downed state doesn’t scales with the number of opponents either.

So what is death shroud? Death shroud is a downed state.
You can use it only to buy time, hoping the situation turns in your favour, with little to no control on the outcome… exactly like when you are downed. Fun fact: death shroud was the necromancer’s downed state before being lazily promoted to profession mechanic during development.

The whole profession is balanced around the 2nd health bar idea, while we really have a glorified downed state, and it’s supposed to cover for the lack of invulnerability and mobility. How can you fix this mess without completely reworking death shroud?

Our profession mechanic is to enter and exit a downed state at will. Next time you are wondering why death shroud is so hated ask yourself “Do I enjoy being downed?”.

Truer words have never been spoken.
My eyes have been opened.
+100

Charblaze.6958:

Softspoken.2410:

Charblaze.6958:

Every time someone says that necro has a second healthbar a kitten dies.
Every. Single. Time.

I’m curious, what’s the preferred categorization of Death Shroud’s defensive capabilities then? It’s not like it’s a period of invulnerability, or extra dodges. It’s also not nothing, even if general consensus is that it’s not enough.

It isn’t a health bar because:

• Health bars are always full at start while life force is empty
• Health bars don’t drain over time.
• Health bars don’t prevent healing.

It isn’t an invulnerability because:

• You are still being hit by CC and conditions.
• It doesn’t scales with the number of enemies.

What’s the closest thing to death shroud?

• Life force drains like the downed bar.
• You are locked out of your skills and utilities as if you were downed.
• You can’t use your heal when you are downed.
• CC and conditions are effective against downed players.
• The downed state doesn’t scales with the number of opponents either.

So what is death shroud? Death shroud is a downed state.
You can use it only to buy time, hoping the situation turns in your favour, with little to no control on the outcome… exactly like when you are downed. Fun fact: death shroud was the necromancer’s downed state before being lazily promoted to profession mechanic during development.

The whole profession is balanced around the 2nd health bar idea, while we really have a glorified downed state, and it’s supposed to cover for the lack of invulnerability and mobility. How can you fix this mess without completely reworking death shroud?

Our profession mechanic is to enter and exit a downed state at will. Next time you are wondering why death shroud is so hated ask yourself “Do I enjoy being downed?”.

For defensive usage: pretty much this.

Downed state

• Cannot move
• Cannot exit voluntarily
• When you are out of downed health you are dead, not out of your transformation charge, just dead.
• Have only one skill that does not suck

I’m sticking with a heavily customized invulnerability. Sure, Necro takes hard CC, multiple enemies can ablate your life force in the blink of an eye making it suck for scaling, it decays preventing you from hanging out in it all day, and you have limited skills available as if you cast Lich or even Moa but you still take no damage to health.

Anchoku.8142:

Downed state

• Cannot move
• Cannot exit voluntarily
• When you are out of downed health you are dead, not out of your transformation charge, just dead.
• Have only one skill that does not suck

I’m sticking with a heavily customized invulnerability. Sure, Necro takes hard CC, multiple enemies can ablate your life force in the blink of an eye making it suck for scaling, it decays preventing you from hanging out in it all day, and you have limited skills available as if you cast Lich or even Moa but you still take no damage to health.

Let’s agree to closest then they were both connected after all.

Anchoku.8142:

Downed state

• Cannot move
• Cannot exit voluntarily
• When you are out of downed health you are dead, not out of your transformation charge, just dead.
• Have only one skill that does not suck

I’m sticking with a heavily customized invulnerability. Sure, Necro takes hard CC, multiple enemies can ablate your life force in the blink of an eye making it suck for scaling, it decays preventing you from hanging out in it all day, and you have limited skills available as if you cast Lich or even Moa but you still take no damage to health.

The downed skills are actually quite good. Anyway, I tend to think of deathshroud as a hybrid, having started development as a tanking mechanic to make up for the lack of other damage mitigation skills, but was then turned 180 degrees and given powerful offensive skills, leaving both roles unfilled. For example, if you were to play a condition build, deathshroud has almost zero use for you because of the lack of conditions you can maintain while in it. Power builds manage to benefit the most from deathshroud, but since lifeforce scales off of vitality, good luck staying in deathshroud for long. The only thing I can see deathshroud being really good at is sucking up raw damage, something that would be valuable in another game perhaps, but in GW2 with the evades and all other ways to avoid damage, it falls kind of flat.

@Anchoku:

• Thieves can teleport while downed [Shadow Escape]. Mesmers can teleport, stealth and they leave a decoy behind [Deception]. Elementalists can travel quite a long distance while being invulnerable [Vapor Form]. Death shroud, our only defense, teleports us towards the danger. Mistform downed eles have better mobility than DS necros.
• Warriors can exit voluntary from downed state with [Vengeance] and fight/escape for 15s. Anyway I said that our profession mechanic is to enter and exit a downed state at will, but instead of rallying at half HP we “rally” at our previous HP level.
• Still everything works and behaves exactly as a downed state, except you don’t die when you run out of LF (but you likely will soon after, if you used DS as defense).
• Because DS has plenty of awesome and useful skills.

Did you forget that entering DS used to replace your health bar in the party and target UI, same as when you go downed, save the colour was green instead of red?

Charblaze.6958:

• Still everything works and behaves exactly as a downed state, except you don’t die when you run out of LF (but you likely will soon after, if you used DS as defense).

• You can still move in Death Shroud.
• You gain no benefit for killing or finishing an opponent in Death Shroud
• For versus player formats, you aren’t vulnerable the profession-universal Finisher move.
• You can view buffs & debuffs while in Death Shroud
• Starting life force is proportional to the amount generated by the necromancer, not to the number of times you’ve been downed recently.
• Available on a 10 second cooldown if you have 10% life force, not only when you run out of HP.

I’m not pretending Death Shroud is great here, and its history has certainly left deep marks on the design of the mechanic, (No healing, decaying life force) but saying that it behaves exactly like downed state seems inaccurate to me.

Softspoken.2410:

Charblaze.6958:

• Still everything works and behaves exactly as a downed state, except you don’t die when you run out of LF (but you likely will soon after, if you used DS as defense).

• You can still move in Death Shroud.
• You gain no benefit for killing or finishing an opponent in Death Shroud
• For versus player formats, you aren’t vulnerable the profession-universal Finisher move.
• You can view buffs & debuffs while in Death Shroud
• Starting life force is proportional to the amount generated by the necromancer, not to the number of times you’ve been downed recently.
• Available on a 10 second cooldown if you have 10% life force, not only when you run out of HP.

I’m not pretending Death Shroud is great here, and its history has certainly left deep marks on the design of the mechanic, (No healing, decaying life force) but saying that it behaves exactly like downed state seems inaccurate to me.

The problem is that, in essence, other professions have nice, well thought out mechanics, while Necros got their down state taken, lazily “reworked” aka turned into a transformation, and nothing more, and given a normal downstate. The fact that it once was our downstate is what makes DS so godkitten bad. If it was designed to be anything else, like a proper class mechanic, we propably wouldn’t have these issues. And if it had stayed our downstate it might still not have been an issue, because without deliberate access to it they could have given us all the defensive goodies other classes have, aswell as 90% less DS traits but good normal traits without any godkitten issues. After all, being able to move while downed wouldn’t have been too strong even if left alone, especially since normal revival wasn’t possible in that state.

You necros make me laugh. It could be worse: you could play ele.

Provost.6210:

You necros make me laugh. It could be worse: you could play ele.

You mean we could get Necro to be massively desired in all parts of the game, with tons of viable builds and spells out our asses? Where do I sign?

Provost.6210:

You necros make me laugh. It could be worse: you could play ele.

Most supported by content is ele less is necro.

Charblaze.6958:

Softspoken.2410:

Charblaze.6958:

Every time someone says that necro has a second healthbar a kitten dies.
Every. Single. Time.

I’m curious, what’s the preferred categorization of Death Shroud’s defensive capabilities then? It’s not like it’s a period of invulnerability, or extra dodges. It’s also not nothing, even if general consensus is that it’s not enough.

It isn’t a health bar because:

• Health bars are always full at start while life force is empty
• Health bars don’t drain over time.
• Health bars don’t prevent healing.

It isn’t an invulnerability because:

• You are still being hit by CC and conditions.
• It doesn’t scales with the number of enemies.

What’s the closest thing to death shroud?

• Life force drains like the downed bar.
• You are locked out of your skills and utilities as if you were downed.
• You can’t use your heal when you are downed.
• CC and conditions are effective against downed players.
• The downed state doesn’t scales with the number of opponents either.

So what is death shroud? Death shroud is a downed state.
You can use it only to buy time, hoping the situation turns in your favour, with little to no control on the outcome… exactly like when you are downed. Fun fact: death shroud was the necromancer’s downed state before being lazily promoted to profession mechanic during development.

The whole profession is balanced around the 2nd health bar idea, while we really have a glorified downed state, and it’s supposed to cover for the lack of invulnerability and mobility. How can you fix this mess without completely reworking death shroud?

Our profession mechanic is to enter and exit a downed state at will. Next time you are wondering why death shroud is so hated ask yourself “Do I enjoy being downed?”.

10/10 calling it down state from now on #bringbackshade

Provost.6210:

You necros make me laugh. It could be worse: you could play ele.

i don’t even

Provost.6210:

You necros make me laugh. It could be worse: you could play ele.

Yeah you guys need a lot more invulns, blocks, blinks, passive and active heals, condi cleanses/immunities, mobility, vigor…..I can do this all day…..

Provost.6210:

You necros make me laugh. It could be worse: you could play ele.

I’ll give you Dark Armor, you gimme Renewing Stamina. Fair trades?

Softspoken.2410:

Charblaze.6958:

Every time someone says that necro has a second healthbar a kitten dies.
Every. Single. Time.

I’m curious, what’s the preferred categorization of Death Shroud’s defensive capabilities then? It’s not like it’s a period of invulnerability, or extra dodges. It’s also not nothing, even if general consensus is that it’s not enough.

its not invulnerability or a dodge. Not even close. This type of mechanic has shown up in other games. Usually its called a power shield, force shield, or something along those lines. With varying uses in those games.

Lily.1935:

Softspoken.2410:

Charblaze.6958:

Every time someone says that necro has a second healthbar a kitten dies.
Every. Single. Time.

I’m curious, what’s the preferred categorization of Death Shroud’s defensive capabilities then? It’s not like it’s a period of invulnerability, or extra dodges. It’s also not nothing, even if general consensus is that it’s not enough.

its not invulnerability or a dodge. Not even close. This type of mechanic has shown up in other games. Usually its called a power shield, force shield, or something along those lines. With varying uses in those games.

Only those type of shields don’t give you new skills that are useless for over half of the builds and block you from using the other half of your skills that it doesn’t change. Also they let you heal while protected, and they susually have some form of scaling, AND you can use them from the beginning of a fight. If DS was a true mana/force shield, it would be useful and no Necros would cry about it anymore.