Guild Wars 2

The real problem with this change isn’t consume conditions. CC is freakin amazing and is absolutely in the top 5 for best heals in the game. Even after the change it will still be great for many builds.

The real problem is that all our other heals suck, and instead of buffing them to encourage their use Anet is nerfing CC to force us towards them instead. This is the exact opposite of what should be done. When one skill dominates across all builds, but necros are still in a horrible spot, it should be obvious to buff the other skills instead of nerfing the only passable one. At this point I would even accept a revert to the well of blood nerf from ages ago.

No it’s not consume conditions was amazing “on paper” then you realize the cast time and see all the counterplay making it a solid heal. Now it just became lackluster because they nerfed the hp/s by 20% and added an extra loss of healing through vulnerability.

Also condi removal skill applies condis on the users.

CC was fine. It shouldn’t have been changed at all, the other heals should have been buffed (which wasn’t super hard to do either) to make them attractive.

Stop saying CC is one of the strongest, the cast time with necro’s nature made it fine/appropriate and yes the other heals sucks and will continue to based on upcoming changes, plz only equip SoV in open PvE.

I’m going to point my finger at CC all day, I don’t even care that mother says it’s rude. I’m also going to give Plague and the Curses line dirty looks.

Sagat.3285:

Stop saying CC is one of the strongest, the cast time with necro’s nature made it fine/appropriate and yes the other heals sucks and will continue to based on upcoming changes, plz only equip SoV in open PvE.

If you can manage conditions well and have healing power and/or bloodthirst, SoV can honestly be a better pick than CC in many cases. It makes us less dependent on manual self healing while giving us more DPS when we do. I wonder if SoV got a boost to siphoning like the other life steals, due to the base lining of Bloodthirst.

The problem has always been that power builds usually lack condition transfer/removal to make up for the lack of CC. So they never really have a choice other than to take CC in addition to other options being lackluster. Condi builds never really needed CC, but take it anyways because WoB requires healing power investment to be better and SoV the same, but with the added active uncertainty.

The CC change is very counter intuitive to how CC is used. The same way not having life steals work in DS made SoV usage counter intuitive to use.

SoV is best used as an efficient heal rather than an emergency heal (although that does happen). The passive promotes active use before entering DS, so we can kill some time shrouded while we wait for the passive to reactivate again. So when we used SoV we naturally entered or were forced to enter death shroud to protect our health. This completely wasted the active’s healing potential. With the new SoV change, active usage will be intuitive and the active’s healing will be much more effective while in DS protected by a life force bar.

CC is best used as an emergency heal and condi clenser, usually after soaking up both power and condi damage with Death Shroud. With good timing we can exit DS and benefit from any condi stacks for a great heal and condi clear. With these changes the emergency heal will now arguably put necro’s more in a bind, increasing enemy damage by 10% while waiting for death shroud to recharge. We will have to save another condi clear or transfer for DS exit or else possibly die faster than we already were before using CC. This extra condi removal/transfer isn’t really available to power builds.

Even Shrouded Removal won’t help you since you already used DS. Spiteful Renewal may be a life saver though, being a mini CC vs. enemies below 25% health every 5 seconds.

I do like the idea of corruption skills being more punishing (more condis to play with using transfers), but they definitely need to boost them with this much punishment.

CC should’ve never been touched on. But I do agree on other heals. They need to be more reliable for Necromancers to use ‘on the go’ instead of getting in combat or stopping in one place to heal instead. Just imagine when you are being chased in PvP…terror.

As I said before: Anet fears buffing Necros “too much” or they’ll suddenly have a vicegrip on PvP’s/WvW’s kitten. Which won’t happen because, honestly, anything the Necro does? Thieves and Engineers do it better.

A lot better.

A buff to Signet of Vampirism would be nice, something like it lasting on a static timer rather than being based on stacks consumed via damage (would be better for PvE necros). Maybe a damage/heal increase on Blood Fiend now that it isn’t the default heal you start with anymore.

All I’m seeing is Anet going “We’re willing to make big splashes in the water for the other classes but we won’t even dip our toes in for the Necromancer.”

FirebrandFrog.7603:

As I said before: Anet fears buffing Necros “too much” or they’ll suddenly have a vicegrip on PvP’s/WvW’s kitten. Which won’t happen because, honestly, anything the Necro does? Thieves and Engineers do it better.

A lot better.

A buff to Signet of Vampirism would be nice, something like it lasting on a static timer rather than being based on stacks consumed via damage (would be better for PvE necros). Maybe a damage/heal increase on Blood Fiend now that it isn’t the default heal you start with anymore.

All I’m seeing is Anet going “We’re willing to make big splashes in the water for the other classes but we won’t even dip our toes in for the Necromancer.”

Why do I feel like DS has something to do with this??

Sagat.3285:

FirebrandFrog.7603:

As I said before: Anet fears buffing Necros “too much” or they’ll suddenly have a vicegrip on PvP’s/WvW’s kitten. Which won’t happen because, honestly, anything the Necro does? Thieves and Engineers do it better.

A lot better.

A buff to Signet of Vampirism would be nice, something like it lasting on a static timer rather than being based on stacks consumed via damage (would be better for PvE necros). Maybe a damage/heal increase on Blood Fiend now that it isn’t the default heal you start with anymore.

All I’m seeing is Anet going “We’re willing to make big splashes in the water for the other classes but we won’t even dip our toes in for the Necromancer.”

Why do I feel like DS has something to do with this??

Because at the end of the day, Anet apparently balances all their classes around their unique mechanic, and the Necromancer basically gets to say “I have 2 health bars”. So it means that Necros don’t get to be tanky, even though they’re the least bursty of the three cloth classes AND has the least survivability, and being “good at attrition” means nothing if YOU CAN’T BE ALIVE.

But if you have 10 stacks of frickin’ vulnerability, then both of those healthbars mean nothing when they’re melted in seconds. You’ll die before you get to do any of your attrition stuff.

As a friend always says, the best CC is Death.

Necromancers (and really, ALL classes) need to be balanced for their base worth and merit rather than their class-only gimmick. And then, you know, actually differentiate skills and traits based on PvE/WvW and PvP balancing. If Anet is so afraid to balance the Necromancer because of the fear of busting him, then split your balance changes across game modes. Anet did it the first time with GW1 and its 3 expacs. It surely can’t be that hard to do again.

It’s a bad change. Just compare with other profession’s healing skills. It’s called unbalanced.