Guild Wars 2

15 charrs

/end thread

I feel like this just isn’t the correct sentiment to have. Even now, after people are still coming to terms with the PvE changes they gave us this last patch, Necromancer is still a perfectly valid and strong profession, it just has minor incongruencies with the rest of the game that need to be helped.

Necro in PvE currently suffers from filling a role that no one needs at the high end: We are able to be a DPS spec with completely unmatched sustain, however the top end of PvE players don’t need hypertanks and Necro DPS is generally worse than every other profession’s, especially given the lack of meaningful group support it offers.

Necro in PvP-style gamemodes is simply a punching bag. It doesn’t have enough mitigation to deal with the guaranteed group focus that it will receive in most circumstances. Necro can absolutely survive in some ridiculous situations, but only ones that involve fighting rather than running since mobility is pretty much unheard of for the class. ANet’s justification for this is the strength of our anti-support role; If we want a target to eat dirt and we are taking no pressure, then we can bury a target in soft CC and debilitating conditions. The thing here is that most of these “super-corruption” specs require the use of most of their utility slots and trait choices. If ANet were to give Necro active defense options in utilities or in an alternative trait option such as Death Magic, then it would naturally break up some of the strength of the corruption trains due to tradeoffs.

Even with these things said, Necro can be very strong if played well and played correctly. Necro also easily has the greatest variety in terms of trait choices and utilities that are actually usable. You can say the class is lacking in a few departments, but I don’t think it’s fair to say the class isn’t “great” in some regards or that the class is subpar.

I completely agree, however the quote is being hyperbolic. If I didn’t think the necro class was great, i wouldn’t have multiple necro’s. However its getting annoying with every patch, there seems to be nerfs to the most used skills, and buffs to the least used weapons.

It becomes even more of an issue with how social this game is, especially when its regarding necromancer use in raids/high teir fractals. I have a thick skin, granted, but it’s annoying that I am simply ignored or disregarded as a special snowflake when playing my favorite build (valk shout reaper). Which is only slightly different from the same build I was using pre-HoT.

In small scale WvW, the class is literally the worst is has ever been. It has bulk and average damage, but no sustain whatsoever. It has one of the weakest heals, because it is easily interrupted. The average damage output is a joke when other classes have high damage builds with more sustain and more than enough bulk. Necromancer used to be among the best 1v1. Now it is below average 1v1, with multiple classes including the omnipresent thief and druid calling themselves hard counters.
I think damage has scaled too high since HoT, which has made bulk obsolete, and instead of reducing damage, Healing was tuned up to insane levels.
A global nerf to all forms of damage and healing would increase the value of raw bulk without nuking specific builds in PvP. Alternatively, buffing the effectiveness of raw bulk (health/armor) would greatly help Necromancer. However, Warrior would probably need sustain nerfs because its bulk would be good enough to support it again.

Cecilia.5179:

…It has one of the weakest heals, because it is easily interrupted…

Consume Conditions is easily one of the single strongest abilities in the game: It is an uncapped condition cleanse that heals for 9k easy, 7k average, on potentially a 20 second cooldown. Sure, the cast time is inhibiting, but if the cast time alone is your only basis for calling the ability bad, then I’m 100% calling your bluff.

I also wouldn’t say that Necromancer has no sustain. You can easily tune builds to have proper sustain using sources such as Blighter’s Boon, Master of Corruptions, Soul Marks, Vital Persistence, Parasitic Contagion, etc. The problem is that Necromancer sustain is pretty easily outscaled; when you start to get outnumbered or heavily focused, raw HP and healing isn’t enough to actually keep you alive. You need tools such as blocks/evades/invulns/stealths to carry you through until your cooldowns come back up. Necro can do well enough in the 1v1 and potentially 1v2, but you begin to get into dangerous territory from there.

No bluff. When I fight condi necro on my condi ranger, I save my CC for his heal, and I interrupt it almost every time. Necromancers usually avoid plague signet (I use it, but a lot don’t), and staff 4 is inadequate by itself.
Necromancer without his heal literally just sits there and melts.
It struggles in 1v1 against anything that has more mobility and good cleanse.

It’s a great heal if you can get it off, but when you’re playing against competent opponents, it’s very difficult due to the long cast time.

The extra condition added to it was totally unnecessary.

Avigrus.2871:

It’s a great heal if you can get it off, but when you’re playing against competent opponents, it’s very difficult due to the long cast time.

The extra condition added to it was totally unnecessary.

Don’t forget the astounding idiocy that was increasing the base cooldown incase anyone took the ridiclous MoC trait.

I still have no idea why Anet thought that making ConCon a corruption would be anything other than utterly stupid. It’s a condition cleanse that self-conditions. I mean come on…

Against competent opponents you just use competent lines of play, like using Consume Conditions out of Shroud after channeling out Infusing Terror. It’s not that difficult to make it work. Need to heal? Bait out CC with “Chilled to the Bone!” or profit from the Stability; works perfectly in the Ranger matchup since they’ll probably dodge, but their pet obviously won’t. Is it perfect? No, but it shouldn’t be; it’s called “counterplay” for a reason.

Zero Solstice.9754:

Against competent opponents you just use competent lines of play, like using Consume Conditions out of Shroud after channeling out Infusing Terror. It’s not that difficult to make it work. Need to heal? Bait out CC with “Chilled to the Bone!” or profit from the Stability; works perfectly in the Ranger matchup since they’ll probably dodge, but their pet obviously won’t. Is it perfect? No, but it shouldn’t be; it’s called “counterplay” for a reason.

Yet despite this, I have yet to face a necro that does anything other than die trapped in my roots while trying to catch up to me with no chance of ever actually entering melee.

Cecilia.5179:

Zero Solstice.9754:

Against competent opponents you just use competent lines of play, like using Consume Conditions out of Shroud after channeling out Infusing Terror. It’s not that difficult to make it work. Need to heal? Bait out CC with “Chilled to the Bone!” or profit from the Stability; works perfectly in the Ranger matchup since they’ll probably dodge, but their pet obviously won’t. Is it perfect? No, but it shouldn’t be; it’s called “counterplay” for a reason.

Yet despite this, I have yet to face a necro that does anything other than die trapped in my roots while trying to catch up to me with no chance of ever actually entering melee.

Definitely sounds like a player skill issue, although to be fair the Druid matchup is literally: You run in circles until the Necro dies. The Necro only really wins if you mess up.

Zero Solstice.9754:

Cecilia.5179:

Zero Solstice.9754:

Against competent opponents you just use competent lines of play, like using Consume Conditions out of Shroud after channeling out Infusing Terror. It’s not that difficult to make it work. Need to heal? Bait out CC with “Chilled to the Bone!” or profit from the Stability; works perfectly in the Ranger matchup since they’ll probably dodge, but their pet obviously won’t. Is it perfect? No, but it shouldn’t be; it’s called “counterplay” for a reason.

Yet despite this, I have yet to face a necro that does anything other than die trapped in my roots while trying to catch up to me with no chance of ever actually entering melee.

Definitely sounds like a player skill issue, although to be fair the Druid matchup is literally: You run in circles until the Necro dies. The Necro only really wins if you mess up.

Well that’s my point. There’s no effective counterplay. I have to suck at Druid to lose to a Reaper. There’s so much counterplay against Reaper that it has to cast its elite just to maybe get off one heal. If Necromancer had better access to cleanse, Prayer to Dwayna would be a viable heal in comparison to our other heals.

I feel like the “Make [random thing] great again” would be a much more popular meme if it didn’t make so many people sad.

That being said, I think most people are just happy enough the last balance didn’t completely annihilate the class and are fine to just let the necro hide in mediocrity.
Better not draw attention to it and risk having it “buffed” into something useless.

Cecilia.5179:

Zero Solstice.9754:

Cecilia.5179:

Zero Solstice.9754:

Against competent opponents you just use competent lines of play, like using Consume Conditions out of Shroud after channeling out Infusing Terror. It’s not that difficult to make it work. Need to heal? Bait out CC with “Chilled to the Bone!” or profit from the Stability; works perfectly in the Ranger matchup since they’ll probably dodge, but their pet obviously won’t. Is it perfect? No, but it shouldn’t be; it’s called “counterplay” for a reason.

Yet despite this, I have yet to face a necro that does anything other than die trapped in my roots while trying to catch up to me with no chance of ever actually entering melee.

Definitely sounds like a player skill issue, although to be fair the Druid matchup is literally: You run in circles until the Necro dies. The Necro only really wins if you mess up.

Well that’s my point. There’s no effective counterplay. I have to suck at Druid to lose to a Reaper. There’s so much counterplay against Reaper that it has to cast its elite just to maybe get off one heal. If Necromancer had better access to cleanse, Prayer to Dwayna would be a viable heal in comparison to our other heals.

You’re not wrong, but the entire game is rock-paper-scissors down on the most baseline level, not just this one matchup. Is it a good design concept? It sure doesn’t feel like one, but it’s also a regular side effect to having skills, abilities, and designs that cover a wide array of different concepts: You’ll end up having some effects that cancel out or are simply better than others.