Guild Wars 2

I was confused by all the discussion surrounding the dev livestream so I googled it and found these useful notes from dulfy for people who missed it:
http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/1s9xpo/pvp_developer_livestream_notes/

“Necro: Signet of Vampirism. Active put a 25 stack siphon debuff on the target that lasts 5 seconds. Target has a mark on their head so you will know if you get this debuff on you.”

That’s weird… Siphon stacks? Also, am I correct in assuming that these changes are hitting tomorrow?

As stated in this topic, there are new skills in the works for all professions. However, the first of batch of these to come to light will be new healing skills. If the new Thief heal will mix things up in comparison to Hide in Shadows and Withdraw, I’m presuming the new Necro heal will hopefully be of a similar power/interest level. However, note the following:

Consume Conditions is arguably one of the best single target heals in the game.
Well of Blood provides good party utility, and has great healing power scaling in comparison to other heals. Well bonuses.
Blood Fiend does additional damage and heals over time though it comes at the cost of reducing healing availability. Minion bonuses.

Given the existence and, in my opinion, well-rounded-ness of these skills, what sort of thing would a new heal skill need to do to shake things up? Convert LF into health? Effective regeneration in DS?

I would love a healing skill that gives up protection for 5 seconds on a 25 second cooldown, nothing really new but i would love it still.

However your idea of LF into health sounds quite intriguing (sp?) But how should it work?, I see 2 ideas, 1: Losing LF constantly and get healing from it like regeneration or heal yourself depending on how much life force you have.

Healing in Deathshroud would be something awesome as well though.

thief healing skill..

And since necro is the most difficult to balance/is a benchmark for balance (imo)
necro’s will get it up the shaft every patch to see the effects the new skills will have..

Healing in DS trough siphon is, for almost any necro, the most logical next step and requested heal.

We get a signet heal with 0.001% of the warriors healing capabilities and without any healing power scaling. Or a spectral with zero to nothing LF gaining.

Just thinking about unusual stuff for a second but what about something like:

Signet of (I can’t think of a good name):
Passive: generate x life force per second. (would have to be a decent amount)
Active: heal yourself (only a modest heal)

The passive would have to work while in deathshroud. If you trait properly, you could stay in DS with 100% uptime and DS would really be your primary health pool. If you lost all LF, you would be in trouble

Not sure if this type of a heal would be practical but something like it would be interesting

Sepreh.5924:

Just thinking about unusual stuff for a second but what about something like:

Signet of (I can’t think of a good name):
Passive: generate x life force per second. (would have to be a decent amount)
Active: heal yourself (only a modest heal)

The passive would have to work while in deathshroud. If you trait properly, you could stay in DS with 100% uptime and DS would really be your primary health pool. If you lost all LF, you would be in trouble

Not sure if this type of a heal would be practical but something like it would be interesting

It’s really strong that skill if it was to happen, but i freaking love that idea.

we have a well, a minion and another unspecified heal, so a signet or a spectral heal might be a good idea.

For the spectral heal maybe:
-1.5sec. channel, you cant move while channeling it
-youre invulnerable while doing that
-you get life force when you get hit while channeling

as for a good heal-signet: i have no idea

And what about Signet of Undeaths passive, which gives LF and with Signet of Locust active, which does aoe live steal?

I suspect it will do something with lifeforce. I hope its a passive regen heal of some kind though.

Dalanor.5387:

And what about Signet of Undeaths passive, which gives LF and with Signet of Locust active, which does aoe live steal?

The passive on signet of undeath is not powerful enough to be meaningful and I do not think that it works while in DS. The active of a signet like this would probably heal for around what healing signet or signet of restoration heals for (3,275 (0.5)).

Would be pretty cool for necros to get something similar to Troll Unguent, healing over time, but both healing and giving life force.

Perhaps a signet that grants health regen inversely proportional to our life force? What I mean is that it gives us more healing when we are empty than full. Would provide a niche for bunkers that balance both pools.

Things necros have on healing skills:
1) Passive regen via Bloodfiend
2) Condition removal via Consume Conditions
3) Group healing via Well of Blood

Things that would make sense/are needed:
1) Some kind of life force <-> hp conversion and/or generation like the warriors’ Healing Surge. Imagine a heal that healed for more the higher your life force (LF) was; and if your LF was low, it would generate LF.

2) A heal that gives block/evade like the guardian heal. Currently necros are the only profession which cannot avoid damage through skills that grant evade/blocks. There are several cases in PVE dungeons and PVP where such a skill is needed to avoid getting instantly killed. It’s very strange that 1 out of the 8 professions does not have such a skill.

3) Heal that grants stability/vigor (we can already get protection with traits + wells and spectral wall). Again, necro is the only class without access to these life-saving boons (not counting elite transforms)

Rumor is that we are getting a lifesteal signet with no burst heal on activation. Sounds pretty sorry unless the lifesteal base values are huge and we all know they wolnt be.

nekretaal.6485:

Rumor is that we are getting a lifesteal signet with no burst heal on activation. Sounds pretty sorry unless the lifesteal base values are huge and we all know they wolnt be.

So… another Blood Fiend?

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

nekretaal.6485:

Rumor is that we are getting a lifesteal signet with no burst heal on activation. Sounds pretty sorry unless the lifesteal base values are huge and we all know they wolnt be.

So… another Blood Fiend?

Actually, this would be a really cool change for vampire builds. If it is a true “life steal” signet, it will do damage armor-piercing damage on the opponent and heal you at the same time. This would compensate for the lower dps of vampire builds. It would also benefit from all the blood-line traits.

Well if it is a lifesteal heal then I can definately see using it for pve when i dont need condi cleanse.

But that’s why it would suck.

The Blood traits exist. Therefore, to balance out the new heal, it will be balanced at (100% effectiveness – Blood traits).

Then there is the demonstrated fear anet has of lifesteal. The values will never be high enough to be worthwhile.

Assume warrior healsig is OP at 400 heal per second and terribad at 250 heal per second. The maximum theoretical lifesteal to match healsig would be 200 heal per second with 200 dps, but that 200 heal per second is nowhere near the sustain you need to stay alive. And even that 200 is based on also having the blood traits and points in healing (see above point).

Introduction of a lifesteal sig means the blood traits will never be fixed/will always be horrible and could mean future DPS nerfs for power builds.

Vampiric Signet
passive: Siphon health whenever you hit a foe (Life siphon damage: 300/Life siphon healing: 300)
active: gain 100% life force

Vampiric signet would be welcome since i really enjoy the life leeching archetype.
Maybe it also could reward aggression and use of the active component by letting it leech a mediocre amount per hit or per( per sec?) as the passive and enhancing the next n attacks with a stronger siphon? That way it could be utilized as a dmg boost(and health boost) that comes with the cost of disabling the passive on hit health. This would add some risk/reward mechanic in either trying to finish something off quicker or keeping the sustain.

Just turn Well of Blood into a water field. The light field is unusable for rally stacks and the heal pulse is too slow to be used for anything else.

How the kitten did we get a kittening light field anyway?!!?!?!? Is that some sort of kittening joke?!?!??!?!?!

Nagato no Kami.4980:

Just turn Well of Blood into a water field. The light field is unusable for rally stacks and the heal pulse is too slow to be used for anything else.

How the kitten did we get a kittening light field anyway?!!?!?!? Is that some sort of kittening joke?!?!??!?!?!

Balance. I believe it used to be a water field, but to my knowledge its already the strongest healing skill in the game if you just consider the sheer max HP healed it can achieve, so having it as a water field just made it even more ridiculous. Plus the Light field’s combos actually make a lot of sense for us.

nekretaal.6485:

Rumor is that we are getting a lifesteal signet with no burst heal on activation. Sounds pretty sorry unless the lifesteal base values are huge and we all know they wolnt be.

I don’t know the mechanics of it, but I have heard indirectly through people on the alpha servers that it is a life-steal of some sort.

@Bhawb
I’d forgo the pulse heals entirely if they just made it a water field with enough duration to summon and blast the two bone minions.

And perhaps the effects of light fields make sense but thematically, not really.

I found this on reddit earlier today :

-Signet of Vampirism: Signet Passive: Siphon life from enemies that strike you. Signet Active: Mark an enemy. Allied players will steal life from that enemy.

http://i.imgur.com/f1hCfRG.png

http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/1ryeur/8_brand_new_healing_skills_previewed_this_friday/cdsiaax

Would be really interesting if it is true. Some nice combo with retaliation, the active part would be nice for those chanelled skills + group support + minion master sustain.

hmmm so is somewhat like order of the vampire with a retaliation twist.
considering we can systain retaliation axe might become an appealing option.

Edit: of course the numbers might still be silly,and it still might not work through ds.

Brujeria.7536:

I found this on reddit earlier today :

-Signet of Vampirism: Signet Passive: Siphon life from enemies that strike you. Signet Active: Mark an enemy. Allied players will steal life from that enemy.

http://i.imgur.com/f1hCfRG.png

http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/1ryeur/8_brand_new_healing_skills_previewed_this_friday/cdsiaax

Would be really interesting if it is true. Some nice combo with retaliation, the active part would be nice for those chanelled skills + group support + minion master sustain.

why are there so many lifeleech-like heals there?

this should be necro-only stuff. im a little bit mad now

The active looks really nice (as long as Necro’s benefit from it too – it just says allies). Cheers to Necro support skills!

However, the passive looks terrible really wish it was siphon on hit rather than siphon when getting hit

I’m imagining the following:

- Mob/Player/Boss hits you for 3000
- You siphon 100 life.

It’s order of the vampire, cool.

The life force → health one sounds interesting. Costs 50% life force, but heals for a large amount.

About “Signet of the Necromancer killed a Warrior and now wears their healing Signet” ?

That would be a pretty sweet signet.

Brujeria.7536:

I found this on reddit earlier today :

-Signet of Vampirism: Signet Passive: Siphon life from enemies that strike you. Signet Active: Mark an enemy. Allied players will steal life from that enemy.

http://i.imgur.com/f1hCfRG.png

http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/1ryeur/8_brand_new_healing_skills_previewed_this_friday/cdsiaax

Would be really interesting if it is true. Some nice combo with retaliation, the active part would be nice for those chanelled skills + group support + minion master sustain.

Oh god I hope those aren’t real. Look at the ones Warrior and Engineer get. I was joking with a buddy earlier tonight that Warriors would get something like “go invulnerable while healing” And it being a stance means they can extend it too, not to mention no channel time.

Our signet, depending on how much the Siphon is for, has very strong potential.

Perma retaliation like effect, and the healing every time we are hit is essentially straight damage reduction. For example, if we siphon 100 HP every time we get hit, its like reducing every single hit by 100 damage.

I love the idea of this signet, although I need to see the numbers if the siphon is remotely significant, I can see it being good in all game modes depending on build. PvE builds would allow us really strong group support for the LoS stack and face-kitten boss fights. WvW will be proccing, EVERYWHERE. PvP will be good for builds that don’t necessarily need CC or WoB. I just really hope that it scales well with healing power, because it’ll work best with Blood Magic support builds that also have self-healing.

One worry… Blood Fiend is getting even MORE useless as a heal.

A 10 point trait will reduce the CD by 20% as well, and a 10 point trait that has little competition.

I’m hoping for more siphons, maybe a Vampiric signet? I like the playstyle.

If this is true, this signet and our other siphons better heal us in ds by then.

Blood Fiend is a god awful skill/heal. I don’t want something like warrior’s healing signet (I wouldn’t complain but we all know it would get nerfed), but maybe something the elementalist’s healing signet, in that we gain a small amount of health per attack as the passive effect and then a burst heal as the active effect? I don’t know.

Bhawb.7408:

Our signet, depending on how much the Siphon is for, has very strong potential.

Perma retaliation like effect, and the healing every time we are hit is essentially straight damage reduction. For example, if we siphon 100 HP every time we get hit, its like reducing every single hit by 100 damage.

I love the idea of this signet, although I need to see the numbers if the siphon is remotely significant, I can see it being good in all game modes depending on build. PvE builds would allow us really strong group support for the LoS stack and face-kitten boss fights. WvW will be proccing, EVERYWHERE. PvP will be good for builds that don’t necessarily need CC or WoB. I just really hope that it scales well with healing power, because it’ll work best with Blood Magic support builds that also have self-healing.

One worry… Blood Fiend is getting even MORE useless as a heal.

A 10 point trait will reduce the CD by 20% as well, and a 10 point trait that has little competition.

My one primary concern about it is that it seems to not have a direct heal for the necro. This can be a huge issue. For example, say you’re fighting a backstab thief. You don’t have the ability to heal in that situation because he isn’t hitting you much (when he does hit, it’s much harder than the signet will siphon for) and keeps stealthing so the active is useless.

And, of course, the fact that it would be most useful to us tanking hits in DS when we can’t get the healing.

Pretty useless passive that don’t work very well with another signet “Plague”(taking dmg when no one hits you)

Siphon on hit is way better than Siphon when getting hit.

Passive is useless in pve and i suspect the active will be bad for trash mobs because it sounds like single target. Will be good for group dps increase on bosses especially under timewarp. The real question of whether this becomes viable is if the healing is decent on the active and its instant cast. If its not instant cast then the healing has to be very good for it to be worth it for me. Also depends on how long the active lasts. Theres so many ways this skill could turn out as a massive dissapointment. If the passive turns out to be siphon on hit then they avoid most of those problems.

Yey a signet that scales with healing power and does nothing but mark a target that will probably lose insignificant amounts of HP when my team hits it..! :S
then again if the mark ramains on the target untill i take it off or swap then i could understand this skill ^^

I understand i asked for insidious parasite to become a skill in guildwars 2 but this i didn’t really expect.

And this skill has to replace/be benificial for? more tanks to counter the obscene dps that ele’s warrior’s guardians and mesmers will do 10 december?

if the lifesteal would be significant .. like 1khp i might swap it and go tank otherwise.. meh..

Wait – so the passive on the potential new heal will reward dire condi necros who can stack toughness while maintaining obscene condition damage but won’t do anything for power necros who have to pick between actually dealing damage and toughness?

No way

I understand that the active is supposed to be for team support but we already have WoB for that.

EDIT:
I know that a passive like this would benefit high toughness “zergmancers” during large WvW battles but those builds already do well in those settings. I am selfish and want a heal that will benefit power necromancers in small scale WvW.

Bhawb.7408:

Our signet, depending on how much the Siphon is for, has very strong potential.

Perma retaliation like effect, and the healing every time we are hit is essentially straight damage reduction. For example, if we siphon 100 HP every time we get hit, its like reducing every single hit by 100 damage.

I love the idea of this signet, although I need to see the numbers if the siphon is remotely significant, I can see it being good in all game modes depending on build. PvE builds would allow us really strong group support for the LoS stack and face-kitten boss fights. WvW will be proccing, EVERYWHERE. PvP will be good for builds that don’t necessarily need CC or WoB. I just really hope that it scales well with healing power, because it’ll work best with Blood Magic support builds that also have self-healing.

One worry… Blood Fiend is getting even MORE useless as a heal.

A 10 point trait will reduce the CD by 20% as well, and a 10 point trait that has little competition.

traited retaliation will probaby not be combined with the heal from this signet.. i’m pretty sure it won’t be the case..(if it will.. all gods praise anet)
But… If there is an internal cd on the heals then this sig is trash.
but this is a bit of speculation

hey i like this idea, at least they went for something more original than just another thief signet. and if the active “allies can heal hitting the target” works like the other skills of the same kind in the game, that could mean that YOU can heal hitting the target. pretty interesting. now if that had decent numbers this could be really interesting sustain-wise.

Brujeria.7536:

I found this on reddit earlier today :

-Signet of Vampirism: Signet Passive: Siphon life from enemies that strike you. Signet Active: Mark an enemy. Allied players will steal life from that enemy.

ANet needs to stop making signets—especially healing signets. They clearly don’t understand the issue with passive abilities in this game. How is punishing a player for hitting his target 100% of the time balanced in any way?

Gizmorage.6412:

hey i like this idea, at least they went for something more original than just another thief signet. and if the active “allies can heal hitting the target” works like the other skills of the same kind in the game, that could mean that YOU can heal hitting the target. pretty interesting. now if that had decent numbers this could be really interesting sustain-wise.

Thats what I was thinking. But it depends on the cast time, the cooldown, the duration and the heal numbers. Quite a few factors that could make it a very bad skill.

The concern I have if this is indeed what we are getting is the value we get healed for on hit. There is no point in being healed by say 100 if your getting hit for 4k as its just going to be another useless skill added to the list of other useless skills.

Same goes for the on hit part, if you do not get enough healing from hitting the enemy or being hit then no-one is going to take it as they will be worse off.

Scarran.9845:

The concern I have if this is indeed what we are getting is the value we get healed for on hit. There is no point in being healed by say 100 if your getting hit for 4k as its just going to be another useless skill added to the list of other useless skills.

It has to be a big number, for the signet to be worth equipping on anything other than a dire necro.

I wish they would change it “on hit” though, if it’s a small number.

well as we have almost no info here is what i think: not a fixed amount but a percentage of damage healed. makes more sense to me

If Anet finaly make signets work in DS and if we can heal in DS too, that will make it an awesome skill.

ah that would be the perfect excuse they’ll have for not allowing healing in DS: “but you could basically go in ds and heal full health”. bam!