Guild Wars 2

I don’t understand the amount of tears over nerfing Vital Persistence.

Raise your hand if you have already been playing Reaper without Soul Reaping,

Me!

“I don’t play thing so I don’t care if it got destroyed” the topic.

Necros are the whine meta class. Anyone viewing the patch as a whole as anything other than a buff to the class shouldn’t be playing power reaper. This patch makes power reaper dps competitive in raids overnight, opens up new builds with some great synergy for open world and instanced pve, and allows you to trait for permanent swiftness that also acts as a stun break that also happens to remove chill, cripple and immobilize that can be used every 10s.

Do I think the VP nerf was unnecessary, yes. Do I think making it a 3% base as a minor trait would be good for the class, yes. Is it the end of the kittening world for the class, not by a long shot. Get a grip people…

Typically those who didn’t need SR were those who played braindead Condi based builds (to include hybrids). This was supposed to be the patch that buffed power reaper, not nerf them into oblivion.

Elessaria.9142:

Necros are the whine meta class. Anyone viewing the patch as a whole as anything other than a buff to the class shouldn’t be playing power reaper. This patch makes power reaper dps competitive in raids overnight, opens up new builds with some great synergy for open world and instanced pve,

BAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAAHHA
HAHAAHAHAAHAAHAAHAHAAHAAHAHAAHAHAAHAAHAHAAHAHAAHHAAH
AHAAHAHAAHAHAAHAHAAHAHAAHAHAHAAHAHAAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAAHAAHAHAAHAHAAHAHAAHAHAHAHAAHAHAAHAH-dies from lack of oxygen-

Elessaria.9142:

This patch makes power reaper dps competitive in raids overnight

Could you explain that? I am not into PvE so I am really curious.

allows you to trait for permanent swiftness that also acts as a stun break that also happens to remove chill, cripple and immobilize that can be used every 10s.

Okay here I can join the discussion and you are very far away from a practical point of view. When you keep up perma swiftness you give up having the rest of your mentioned functionality on demand (!). The theoretical perma-swiftness is useless, wenn you want to use shroud for cleanse/stunbreak…whatever.

Keeping your classes sustain mechanic on cooldown is a pretty stupid idea.

On top of that: After the nerf to VP and SoS you can’t give up warhorn just because you have an additional source of swiftness. Now you need Warhorn5 more than ever beforce in combat to manage that kitten 4% degeneration.

All in all you are even less flexible than before. Both, casting Warhorn5 and flashing shroud for swiftness out of combat puts you in a really bad position when you suddenly run into an encounter.

Brigg.3961:

Typically those who didn’t need SR were those who played braindead Condi based builds (to include hybrids). This was supposed to be the patch that buffed power reaper, not nerf them into oblivion.

You literally just got a trait that allows you an extra 270 Power whilst in Shroud, and you think it’s unfair you can’t stay in Shroud as long.

Elessaria.9142:

Brigg.3961:

Typically those who didn’t need SR were those who played braindead Condi based builds (to include hybrids). This was supposed to be the patch that buffed power reaper, not nerf them into oblivion.

You literally just got a trait that allows you an extra 270 Power whilst in Shroud, and you think it’s unfair you can’t stay in Shroud as long.

well 270 Power look at that Our self sustain nonexistent mobility,block,immune and self healing allready fixed while also fixing the issue that made us into the number 1 tunnel target….

yeah… go pvp pls as a power reaper and stop thinking with the useless AFK pve mindset….

Brigg.3961:

Typically those who didn’t need SR were those who played braindead Condi based builds (to include hybrids). This was supposed to be the patch that buffed power reaper, not nerf them into oblivion.

Tell me how power reaper is not brain dead again? VP nerf affects how much RS1 you can throw out, it doesn’t affect any of the RS skills in the long run. If pressing 1 all day isnt brain dead, i dont know what is, because you sure as hell can’t do that on a condi build.

Elessaria.9142:

Brigg.3961:

Typically those who didn’t need SR were those who played braindead Condi based builds (to include hybrids). This was supposed to be the patch that buffed power reaper, not nerf them into oblivion.

You literally just got a trait that allows you an extra 270 Power whilst in Shroud, and you think it’s unfair you can’t stay in Shroud as long.

Said trait is at the cost of our +20% damage whilst foe is below 50% hp. Seems like even if it is a dps gain, it would be very minor. And we’re still at least 10k behind other dps raid classes when it comes to power builds. +180 power (or 280 in shroud) isn’t going to add that much.

I tried testing Soul Spiral (our favorite spin2win skill) with the improved spite signet via traiting the new spite of suffering vs regular signet of spite. I removed all equipment except my ascended viper greatsword.

Improved Signet of Spite: tooltip says 1824 damage.
Regular Signet of Spite: tooltip says 1500 damage.

An added 324 damage which is somewhat 21.6% increase of the original. Close to Death gives 20% damage (if target is less than 50% HP). So the new spite of suffering trait does give a good boost slightly better than close to death but without the 50% HP prerequisite. That is just one skill in shroud though because I’m too lazy.

Soul Reaping was a fairly vital part of reinforcing the fantasy of the Reaper elite specialization, as it was sold, in part, on its ability to camp in Death Shroud. (It was also billed as a power spec.) As such, Vital Persistence and Speed of Shadows contributed greatly to the Reaper’s fantasy.

Jinn… You are aware that if you wear full equipment, this percentage given by the signet will lower a lot, right?

Anyway, this change to signet and any other change they’ve done won’t change 1 thing : The necromancer grant nothing to the raid that can’t be granted in a better way by any of the other professions of the game. And that’s why the necromancer will still sit have a spectator seat and not a player seat.

Necro has been a DoT class in every MMO i’ve ever played, so I always play one that way. Never really thought of rolling one for direct damage, doesn’t really fit the theme to me.

So I don’t use SR much, unless it’s for Dhuumfire.

Vyrulisse.1246:

“I don’t play thing so I don’t care if it got destroyed” the topic.

Pretty much this. How can anyone argue for less build diversity…

Zoltreez.6435:

Elessaria.9142:

Necros are the whine meta class. Anyone viewing the patch as a whole as anything other than a buff to the class shouldn’t be playing power reaper. This patch makes power reaper dps competitive in raids overnight, opens up new builds with some great synergy for open world and instanced pve,

BAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAAHHA
HAHAAHAHAAHAAHAAHAHAAHAAHAHAAHAHAAHAAHAHAAHAHAAHHAAH
AHAAHAHAAHAHAAHAHAAHAHAAHAHAHAAHAHAAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAAHAAHAHAAHAHAAHAHAAHAHAHAHAAHAHAAHAH-dies from lack of oxygen-

Insta-laughdeath

I’m not even concerned too much about the vital persistence nerf. It absolutely weakened the defensive portion of what we had, but the biggest nerf was to speed of shadows. Having shroud available every 7 seconds was a huge benefit for synergy with a dozen other rotations and traits. It’s amazing to me how much impact that 3 seconds can make when waiting for a stunbreak/stability among other things. Blighter’s boon is almost useless as a back up sustain now, especially with the vp nerf. They buffed spiteful spirit, but I have to wait 3 more seconds for that now too. Not to mention the timing for all of the weapon/shroud/skill rotations are thrown out of whack. It doesn’t matter how much more damage you think you can do if something can kill you faster than you kill them.

Edit: also, if you’re playing power reaper and relying on RS1 to do all of your damage, you’re doing it wrong.

I’ve been playing without SR ever since DC got buffed and I can safely say I don’t miss it, Shroud is not meant to be our second HP bar where you hang there for a lengthy amount of time but more of a tool to help you juggle pressure while giving you strong aoe options. I’d say others who relied on SR for their builds will probably find other alternatives on Scourge or the future Power Reaper as I think Anet will still set those elites apart on their respective roles.

Brigg.3961:

Typically those who didn’t need SR were those who played braindead Condi based builds (to include hybrids). This was supposed to be the patch that buffed power reaper, not nerf them into oblivion.

When I switched from power to hybrid I changed exactly one trait,
Blighter’s boon to deathly chill.

Elessaria.9142:

Brigg.3961:

Typically those who didn’t need SR were those who played braindead Condi based builds (to include hybrids). This was supposed to be the patch that buffed power reaper, not nerf them into oblivion.

You literally just got a trait that allows you an extra 270 Power whilst in Shroud, and you think it’s unfair you can’t stay in Shroud as long.

I haven’t done the math yet, but I’m fairly certain close to death is still better.

Elessaria.9142:

You literally just got a trait that allows you an extra 270 Power whilst in Shroud, and you think it’s unfair you can’t stay in Shroud as long.

You clearly haven’t looked at what Signets of Suffering is competing with in that grandmaster slot.

Signet builds are not a thing, and are even less of a thing now.

Brigg.3961:

Typically those who didn’t need SR were those who played braindead Condi based builds (to include hybrids). This was supposed to be the patch that buffed power reaper, not nerf them into oblivion.

Every relevant condi build uses Soul Reaping with Vital Persistence.

Soul Reaping is more important to condi builds than it is to power builds because condi builds can’t afford to take blighter’s boon.