Guild Wars 2

Here is the scenario: The Dev team comes up and says “We are going to redesign one weapon, what weapon would you chose and how would you change it?”

For me it would be the Staff, though several possible ones that i would like to see changed – Staff is top of the list. For me it just simply isn’t fun to use. It is just pretty much spamming marks and that is it.

Aim for staff: I am a BIG fan of the Mesmer staff skills so that is a warning ahead of time. I hope to mix in a bit of Guardian and maybe Ele in somewhere as well and aim is to make it a condition based weapon still but not rely on AoE, AoE, AoE, AoE for skills as that is terrible design, want something that can be just as good in small groups, solo as it is in Zergs.

Auto Attack:
Necrotic Blast – Bounce a ball of dark energy between targets that inflict Conditions on enemies boons on allies
Conditions: Poison 4seconds, Torment 1 stack 4seconds, Vul, 4 seconds
Boons: Aegis 4 seconds, Protection 2 seconds, Vigor 2 seconds
Bounces: 2
Life Force Gained: 3%

Note:

Yeah this is pretty much a version of Winds of Chaos. The boons changed to be defensive and give us access to Aegis and Vigor which we rather lack, the Protection is just to help us not die all the time. Condition wise, Poison and Torment picked because we lack great access to Poison, i dont really like the Scepter. Torment would be with no condition damage 127damage over 4seconds or 255damage if they are moving could up the stacks and reduce the duration to balance it out, or just reduce the duration alone if needed.This would replace the rather bland and boring Staff Auto attack it currently has.

Skill 2: Decay orb:
Chain Part 1: Send out a decaying orb that inflicts random conditions and damages foes in its path
Chain Part 2: Explode the orb to be teleported to its location dealing AoE damage and inflicting AoE condition damage

Range: 1,200, Cool down: 10 seconds.
Chain Part 1: Conditions – Bleeding, Poison, Burning
Chain Part 2: Conditions – Chill, Cripple, Torment

Note: Idea behind this skill is sort of a mix between Phase retreat (Mesmer) and Orb of Light (Guardian) We need something that can help us get closer to targets that are running, as well as for movement. This skill just like skills of other classes can be used without a target so it can also be used to escape which we really lack.

Skill 3: Necrotic Aura – Envelop yourself in a deathly Aura reducing all physical damage you take by 25% but increases Condition damage you take by 50% When Aura ends all conditions you have are turned into Boons

Cool down: 30seconds, Duration: 5seconds

Note: I did have a few ideas for this such as making you Immune to physical damage but making it so you take 100% more condition damage for the duration but i doubt people would go for that. I think 25% reduced physical damage and 50% more condition damage is okay, You have things like Consume Conditions if you are worried but maybe waiting those few extra seconds would be worth it for all the conditions you have to become Boons. Boons are converted the same way they are with things like Corrupt Boon

Skill 4: Not Sure yet

Skill 5: Not sure yet.

Got 3 of the skills sorted so far, The 5th i know i would want as some sort of AoE but not to sure what, thinking maybe something that summons some minions for a set duration kinda like the Mark of Horror on Lich Form.

Something that deals AoE damage and when dies explodes inflicting conditions

Axe.

Change range to 300. The auto-attack now cleaves and is faster(1/2 second instead of 3/4). Still applying Vulnerability each hit.

Ghastly Claws cleaves as well and does more damage due to the need to be in closer range

Unholy Feast: Steals life from all foes hit. (say 300-500 health per foe hit). Removes one boon(if removed gain a random boon) and applies cripple. Gain retaliation for each foe hit.

Not big changes. Basically making it a cleave weapon for Necro. Auto-attack should do a little bit less DPS than dagger

Staff.

I would want it changed to a melee weapon, with the same shadowy scythe animation on all attacks.

1) Three part auto attack chain that cleaves. Third strike has a longer cast and steals health.
2) Whirl attack. Channeled, with 3 second duration, say like 6 strikes. Each hit applies 1% Vuln. and 5 second Blindness on the last strike. 10 second cd.
3) Ground targeted attack that shoots out in front of the Necro(in a line). Deals some damage and removes up to 2 boons. 900 range, 20 second cd.
4) Single target attack that pulls an enemy to the Necro up to 1200 range(non-projectile) and deals minor damage. 30 second cooldown.
5) Necro kneels down and channels a 3 second cast. During the cast he is immune to all damage and CC, and enemies within 600 range are afflicted with chill, blindness, and weakness with every pulse. 40 sec cd.

The focus here is we need a cleave weapon for PvE, and we also need sustain, and anti mobility skills. Add in the Necro anti boon mechanic for fun.

Obviously they would never take away our only 1200 range weapon, but it would be cool to get a 2hand melee weapon on Necro either way, and I want scythe!

Change the scepter. The staff AoE is useful in many situations, and it favors hybridization because it utilizes both power/conditions.

The scepter could use some change, but just to the number 3 skill; the other skills work great.

The whole do-more-damage-based-on-number-of-conditions seems good in theory, but it’s just not a power weapon. It’s a condition weapon. Having a power attack on a condition weapon is pretty pointless. Plus, this weapon has no control effects.

So change it to this:
Rabid bites: bite your target 5 times, gaining life force with each strike. Your final strike stuns your target (2 seconds) and inflicts torment (10 seconds).

This isn’t overpowered at all, and only inflicts one stack of one condition, while giving you some much-needed control. Plus, it’s very dodge-able.

My inspiration for this came from some of the undead in Orr.

Stx.4857:

Staff.

I would want it changed to a melee weapon, with the same shadowy scythe animation on all attacks.

1) Three part auto attack chain that cleaves. Third strike has a longer cast and steals health.
2) Whirl attack. Channeled, with 3 second duration, say like 6 strikes. Each hit applies 1% Vuln. and 5 second Blindness on the last strike. 10 second cd.
3) Ground targeted attack that shoots out in front of the Necro(in a line). Deals some damage and removes up to 2 boons. 900 range, 20 second cd.
4) Single target attack that pulls an enemy to the Necro up to 1200 range(non-projectile) and deals minor damage. 30 second cooldown.
5) Necro kneels down and channels a 3 second cast. During the cast he is immune to all damage and CC, and enemies within 600 range are afflicted with chill, blindness, and weakness with every pulse. 40 sec cd.

The focus here is we need a cleave weapon for PvE, and we also need sustain, and anti mobility skills. Add in the Necro anti boon mechanic for fun.

Obviously they would never take away our only 1200 range weapon, but it would be cool to get a 2hand melee weapon on Necro either way, and I want scythe!

I would say that’d have to be a new weapon. HOWEVER, I think if they were to give us a 2h cleave weapon, it’d be hammer. A 3 attack auto chain, not super slow like most hammers, but more of the speed of thief sword. It could have similar attacks;

1: A) Smack you foes with you hammer dealing direct damage
B) Bash your foes with the solid face of death, crippling them.
C) Shatter your foes skull with iron will of darkness, dealing PbAoE to all foes in front of you, and apply weakness

2: spin move: spin around in circles applying weakness and vulnerability to all enemies, hits 4 times. 2 1/4 sec cast duration. (6 sec cd)

3: Corrupted Earth: pound the ground with your hammer, dealing direct damage to all enemies around you (PbAoE), and create a Well of Suffering. (15 sec cd)

4: Death’s Grip: Shadow walk to your foe (like Lupicus does in arah p3) and immobilize your foe. (15 sec CD 1200 range)

5: Banshee’s Doom: Pull all foes to you while dealing direct damage (4 hits), and causing weakness and crippled.

I might fiddle with axe a bit. Make the 1 hit two additional nearby targets for 40% damage and 100% vulnerability application. Or make it a full cleave, who knows.

Increasing Axe #1 range to 900 and giving it some cleave/a little bit more damage would be nice. Other than that, I think in general we have pretty good weapons comparing to other classes. They lack something unique, good animations, GW1 Necro’s “sacrifice” and cleave.but in general they work properly.

And to OP – if you want a Mesmer staff, play a Mesmer. It’s prettt easy, you know. I do agree that Staff #1 could use some changes because it’s pretty boring skill (at least it can hit decently in power specs + regenerates LF very quickly if used right)

Make Axe also a meelee weapon (cleave) with little faster attack speed on auto-attack (3 Way chain attack → at third attack you see a demon come out shadows and hit real quick)
2. Skill : Necro starts spinning around and becomes a dark tornado destroying everything on its path (life force gain + vuln stack)
3. Throw Dark Axe / Shoot quick death beam that teleports you to the target and applies poison

Rym.1469:

And to OP – if you want a Mesmer staff, play a Mesmer. It’s prettt easy, you know. I do agree that Staff #1 could use some changes because it’s pretty boring skill (at least it can hit decently in power specs + regenerates LF very quickly if used right)

I have a Mesmer, the whole idea was to make it so that it isn’t a mind numbingly boring weapon with terribly boring skills.

Dagger main hand.

Add cleave… and add cleave. Seriously: perfect weapon, even offhand. But just add cleave.

I think I got a good idea.
Staff:
A) Change the AA: Make the AA have the same animation, but a faster travel rate. Also, make it explode on impact, giving AoE poison or torment. If poison: not extremely strong, but decent duration. If torment, a relatively short duration with a bit of a kick to it, but not too strong. Since the staff AA is pretty slow, even if sped up a little, it would still be pretty slow, the torments duration would only allow it to stack about 2-3 stacks. With staff being basically the only aoe weapon we have, i based this off of a feeling that the basic attack should have some sort of AoE or Cleave.

B) Marks AoE concept: Currently, one person can run ahead of a group and take the damage of the mark so their party members don’t have to. This is kind of stupid as it makes strategically placed marks in choke points much less effective. This is why I propose that marks have a short field duration (except for #4). This could not only help them be more effective, but also provide some interesting combos. Say, perhaps, the mark of blood leaves a dark field while dealing bleed damage. Now you get additional aoe out of the mark, but know someone could use a blast finisher during a Zerg fight and BOOM, not multiple enemies are blinded, greatly helping in the fight.
The #5 skill would not leave a pool of fear, but maybe a poison field, and change the chill marks field to ice!

I would change the scepter. I think both Axe and Staff could use work, but Scepter, as polished as it may look, promotes terrible gameplay since all you have to do is spam auto-attack to deal damage and mess with bleeds. Moreover, it has little synergy with our profession mechanic.

I would see unyielding blast changed to make life blast explode on impact, damaging foes in an AoE around the target, thereby giving necro some sustainable AoE damage. Increase the attack speed so that necro is balanced with other classes’ potential for single target damage, and reduce the number of foes it can hit while traited to 3 so it is balanced for trash and not over-powered. It is already balanced in terms of range by hitting lower if you are outside 600 units.

Staff needs to be reworked. The auto attack doesn’t apply any conditions or deal much damage. The attack is slow to cast and slow to travel. I would make staff auto attack a 3 stage chain. Something like:
1. As it currently is but applies 3s poison.
2. AoE wave out from the target damaging it and nearby foes
3. A wave centering in on the target, damaging nearby foes and the target, inflicting 2s weakness on the target.

Not over-powered, not on par with other classes damage-wise since the first in the chain isn’t AoE and still hits quite low, but a significant improvement to staff’s damaging capability. For marks, I would increase the damage coefficients so they are viable for direct damage builds and the trait Spiteful Marks is no longer completely useless. Damage would still be low for condition specs, naturally, so it remains balanced in that respect. I think this would increase build diversity by making staff viable for direct damage builds and making less-popular and useless traits potentially worth using.

Grok Krog.9581:

Axe.

Change range to 300. The auto-attack now cleaves and is faster(1/2 second instead of 3/4). Still applying Vulnerability each hit.

Ghastly Claws cleaves as well and does more damage due to the need to be in closer range

Unholy Feast: Steals life from all foes hit. (say 300-500 health per foe hit). Removes one boon(if removed gain a random boon) and applies cripple. Gain retaliation for each foe hit.

Not big changes. Basically making it a cleave weapon for Necro. Auto-attack should do a little bit less DPS than dagger

I would say the same.

Mander.6924:

Dagger main hand.

Add cleave… and add cleave. Seriously: perfect weapon, even offhand. But just add cleave.

honestly i’d just get rid of dagger main hand and replace it with a sword. that way there would automatically be a cleave…orrrr add a sword standalone. yeah. do that. yup.

Stx.4857:

Staff.

I would want it changed to a melee weapon, with the same shadowy scythe animation on all attacks.

1) Three part auto attack chain that cleaves. Third strike has a longer cast and steals health.
2) Whirl attack. Channeled, with 3 second duration, say like 6 strikes. Each hit applies 1% Vuln. and 5 second Blindness on the last strike. 10 second cd.
3) Ground targeted attack that shoots out in front of the Necro(in a line). Deals some damage and removes up to 2 boons. 900 range, 20 second cd.
4) Single target attack that pulls an enemy to the Necro up to 1200 range(non-projectile) and deals minor damage. 30 second cooldown.
5) Necro kneels down and channels a 3 second cast. During the cast he is immune to all damage and CC, and enemies within 600 range are afflicted with chill, blindness, and weakness with every pulse. 40 sec cd.

The focus here is we need a cleave weapon for PvE, and we also need sustain, and anti mobility skills. Add in the Necro anti boon mechanic for fun.

Obviously they would never take away our only 1200 range weapon, but it would be cool to get a 2hand melee weapon on Necro either way, and I want scythe!

Anyone can tell that this guy is a power necro XD But indeed if they give us necro a scythe melee weapon, I’m 100% gonna use it no matter it’s a power build weapon or a condition weapon it will look super cool !!!

keloorie.6085:

Stx.4857:

Staff.

I would want it changed to a melee weapon, with the same shadowy scythe animation on all attacks.

1) Three part auto attack chain that cleaves. Third strike has a longer cast and steals health.
2) Whirl attack. Channeled, with 3 second duration, say like 6 strikes. Each hit applies 1% Vuln. and 5 second Blindness on the last strike. 10 second cd.
3) Ground targeted attack that shoots out in front of the Necro(in a line). Deals some damage and removes up to 2 boons. 900 range, 20 second cd.
4) Single target attack that pulls an enemy to the Necro up to 1200 range(non-projectile) and deals minor damage. 30 second cooldown.
5) Necro kneels down and channels a 3 second cast. During the cast he is immune to all damage and CC, and enemies within 600 range are afflicted with chill, blindness, and weakness with every pulse. 40 sec cd.

The focus here is we need a cleave weapon for PvE, and we also need sustain, and anti mobility skills. Add in the Necro anti boon mechanic for fun.

Obviously they would never take away our only 1200 range weapon, but it would be cool to get a 2hand melee weapon on Necro either way, and I want scythe!

Anyone can tell that this guy is a power necro XD But indeed if they give us necro a scythe melee weapon, I’m 100% gonna use it no matter it’s a power build weapon or a condition weapon it will look super cool !!!

i’m down with that. i’m really just biding my time in getting rid of staff. i’m tired of using it, it does nothing for my build.

Lightsbane.9012:

keloorie.6085:

Stx.4857:

Staff.

I would want it changed to a melee weapon, with the same shadowy scythe animation on all attacks.

1) Three part auto attack chain that cleaves. Third strike has a longer cast and steals health.
2) Whirl attack. Channeled, with 3 second duration, say like 6 strikes. Each hit applies 1% Vuln. and 5 second Blindness on the last strike. 10 second cd.
3) Ground targeted attack that shoots out in front of the Necro(in a line). Deals some damage and removes up to 2 boons. 900 range, 20 second cd.
4) Single target attack that pulls an enemy to the Necro up to 1200 range(non-projectile) and deals minor damage. 30 second cooldown.
5) Necro kneels down and channels a 3 second cast. During the cast he is immune to all damage and CC, and enemies within 600 range are afflicted with chill, blindness, and weakness with every pulse. 40 sec cd.

The focus here is we need a cleave weapon for PvE, and we also need sustain, and anti mobility skills. Add in the Necro anti boon mechanic for fun.

Obviously they would never take away our only 1200 range weapon, but it would be cool to get a 2hand melee weapon on Necro either way, and I want scythe!

Anyone can tell that this guy is a power necro XD But indeed if they give us necro a scythe melee weapon, I’m 100% gonna use it no matter it’s a power build weapon or a condition weapon it will look super cool !!!

i’m down with that. i’m really just biding my time in getting rid of staff. i’m tired of using it, it does nothing for my build.

If that scythe comes in the build, I can actually call it an even after all those nerf and basic problems came up from the lack of attrition, just for that super ultra unbelievably cool looking of the scythe .

Axe is the weapon I’d like to see changed. As others have said, either increase the range or shorten it and give it cleave. Either way, attack speed needs to be increased.

Though I’d love to see the Staff #4 Attack (which was great before its horrible nerf but is now sub-par) & #5 Attack (which is arguably the weakest #5 Staff attack [if not weapon attack] in the game) get fixed so that they are greatly improved.
PLEASE Make it so that ALL the Marks work on Downed Players!!!! I mean, really, are we the Only Profession that has 4 of 5 attacks be USELESS on Downed players??

We REALLY NEED A Close-Range AOE Weapon. Every other profession has that, all but Necros. So, I’d have to be in the Fix the Axe crowd. Make the #1 Attack be an Close-Range AoE attack.

Scepter #3, give it a chance to strip 1 boon on hit.

Staff – its great as it is my current main weapon, love it.

Dagger – increase range on #1, I WvW a lot and #1 dagger is nearly useless to me because all fights are in “high mobility” mode, so it just doesn’t hit.

Axe – #1 and #2 increase damage slightly, perhaps via traits, I would like to see axe as main weapon of choice for non-condi and single target PvE DPS builds.

Warhorn – #4 reduce the CD slightly, #5 increase the base damage slightly.

I would change the axe 1 attack to a chain that dealt more overall damage than it currently does, and rips a boon off at the end or something.