Guild Wars 2

ZDragon.3046:

anduriell.6280:

The changes look amazing , thanks Robert!!

But i still miss chill application on crit (33% chance?) because right now in game there is no way of a reliable source of chill and i think with the cast times of the GS t would be a great help.
A little changes in the minor traits would be good:

• Shivers of dread : apply slow (1 sec) on Foes you chill (1/2 sec ICD).
• Cold Shoulder: apply chill on crit 33% chance 2 seconds. Remove the longer chill duration,

This could make the landing of GS skills a bit easier and actually possible.
Also having a reliable source of chill will help to make the reduced damage from chilled foes actually be useful.
I think 1 second of slow plus 2 seconds of chill 1/3 of the time you crit is not much but helps.
To compare how much could a Reaper proc the minor BAreber precision in Curses proc bleedng the same way.

EWWW NO GET OUT WITH THAT!

leave the chill duration alone whats wrong with you lol. You say there is not enough chill in reaper. You are crazy and clearly dont play necro.

i do actually play necro.
My reasoning for asking for slow and more chill are those (Not having in mind reaper skills):

• We only have 2 weapon skills in LONG COOLDOWN that apply chill: staff and focus.
• GS does chill only with 2 skills: Chilling scyte (impossible to land) and Grasping darkness (30 CD).
• We only have ONE utility skill that chill outside of shouts. Spectral Grasp (30 secs CD).
• Suffer! is the only shout that apply chill aside from the elite. 30 secs CD
• Necro does not apply blind, i think in total it has 2 weapon skills that do.

GS skill have a very long cast for weapon skills and Reaper shourd is melee only so suffer stronger attrition than the DS, burning the LF really quick.
Even with the sigil (2 secs chill with 10 secs ICD) or runes (4 secs chill with 30 secs ICD) you could get at max around 10 secs of chill. 20% of that is 2 seconds more and that is not much and i’m talking about the best situation possible that it will never happen.

So although the reaper depends a lot in the chilled condition it only have few ways to apply it. Slow is thematically correct as the monsters in the movies seems to affect their pray making them slower in reaction also (When Jason walks around with the machete and people just stare as him is cutting he way thru for example).

Also It’s a way to get better survivability as slow ins an active defense, that also fits with the necro mechanics itself.

The difference with the mesmer would be in this case, mesme apply slow in ranged AoE while Reaper is mostly focused for melee and single target. The AoE chills from the shouts wouldn’t change much because it would be just 1 second of Slow to one target let’s not forget the ICD i’m proposing what mostly wouldn’t be advertised for the targets (for example the stun from the elite is 1 second longer than the hypothetical slow duration)

Otherwise i don’t see the GS being used much anywhere.

Forgetting Executioner’s Scythe? We have a buttload of Chill in Reaper’s Shroud thanks to that ice field and finishers. It’s very, very easy as a Reaper to have high Chill uptime.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Forgetting Executioner’s Scythe? We have a buttload of Chill in Reaper’s Shroud thanks to that ice field and finishers. It’s very, very easy as a Reaper to have high Chill uptime.

Not to mention because of a minor trait staff #5 and RS#3.b also do aoe chill.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Forgetting Executioner’s Scythe? We have a buttload of Chill in Reaper’s Shroud thanks to that ice field and finishers. It’s very, very easy as a Reaper to have high Chill uptime.

Executioner’s Scythe only apply 1 second of chill that last the same as the Stun it applies. I think the chill there is just to give a nice touch to the skill more than actual utility.

In my tests i couldn’t get any uptime with chilled in gameplay, no theorycrafting here. The base of our chill uptime is the Chilling Scythe but that AA chain is so slow that your target is out of reach most of the times. I think i could land it like 10 times in pvE none in WvW.

In my tests i couldn’t get any uptime with chilled in gameplay, no theorycrafting here.

In my tests in pvp it was extremely easy to maintain extremely high chill uptime. I dont understand you saying there is a lack of chill. You can have 6~12+ ways of applying chill in any single reaper build.

ZDragon.3046:

Which is why i say things likely wont change. I wont retract my steaming plie comment because ts true. You cant please everyone and to remodify for one thing means something else is lost. I don’t think damage modifiers on shroud is a fix to necromancers problem. Boons at this point are worth more than most % damage modifiers yes.

I could care less if you retract any statements. I emphasized that, just like you did in your response to me (get off my back now lol), for the express purpose of showing that it was a biased and not necessarily correct statement. Maybe things won’t change, maybe they will. You are correct, you cannot please everyone. You are not necessarily correct that to modify one thing, that something else needs to be lost. You are 100% correct that damage modifiers on shroud are not a fix for necromancers problems…it would be fix to one of the necromancer’s problems. Yes, you are correct that boons are worth more than most % damage modifiers…with the exception being our case…where we are already getting that boon to max capacity from others. Even that being the case, what I have been suggesting is to have an alternative…not remove what is there in every case. See what I did there…modification…nothing lost. You could add a modifier to a trait in the same tier as an alternative.

Are you saying that shroud is a superior mitigation tool to blocks/invlulns/evades?
hell no
Many of these things are lacking from necromancer but I doubt they will be added onto it. The better adjustment for this would be to simply strip some of the said tools from other professions that have way too much of them. Necro is lacking and behind yes, but if you think adding a block or two will fix the problem you are mistaken. Evades ar out of the question (it does not fit the profession.) Ivulns need to be toned down (mostly on mesmer but thats about it.) Necromancer could use better tools like improved life stealing and maybe a block or reflect skill for projectiles. Shroud is a temporary sub health bar which requires you to give up alot to go into it. It could be adjusted to be better, but we know we won’t see that happen anytime soon. Suck it up and face it. If you don’t like my assumptions feel free to comment all you like but it won’t change my mind.

Sounds like you do already know what’s lacking here, you just have a defeatist attitude about admitting it. I don’t really agree with stripping or diminishing other professions for the shortcomings of this one, but that’s definitely an approach. Clearly those other professions were given those things for a reason. Again, big picture time…I don’t think that “adding a block or two will fix the problem”. I think the sum total of multiple things will fix the problem. Again with assumptions, who says I am talking about anytime soon? Right now, we have the ear of a developer who is taking feed back and actually doing things with said feed back. If he banks the feed back for later changes or implements them now…both are acceptable. Of course I would prefer now, but I have multiple other professions that are desirable in the meantime. I don’t have any need to change your mind or suck anything up. You replied to me remember…not the other way around initially. That clearly says you had a desire to change my mind, if you don’t then I guess I won’t be seeing a reply to this post from you…as you won’t care what I have to say.

I make the majority calls based off of what I read on the here in these post. I make the assumption that Robert would not make another problem to fix a problem thats not what i said, you said that. Im simply saying that in the past when we ask Robert about changes he has responded if with his reason for not doing so and if he say he would look into the change what would have to happen in response to that change.

Fair enough…he did indicate that he did not want to increase DS auto damage. Just be careful to keep that in context. That is a range attack that you do not have to be in melee cleave to use…there is a risk vs reward factor in that…very different than RS auto. I can definitely see your point in how any non RS specific damage modifiers would affect that. As far as these “majority” claims….the jury’s still out on that.

I do assume that something would be removed because 8 times out of 10 in the past something is removed when changes are made. Reaper is one of those few moments where we are not seeing that happen with necromancer and im happy about that.

Exactly, much better developer, which is why this is time to speak up.

Robert does a good job at managing necromancer but he is not quick to make his calls and i don’t think a few changes for pve will outweigh what the game is based around (WvW and PvP) Because the moment it did you will have people saying that necromancer is not worthy in pvp and wvw. I am allowed to assume things just as much as you are.

I agree, a few changes for PvE will not outweigh any other game mode. I don’t agree that the game is based around WvW or PvP. If it was, then there would not be so much emphasis on PvE content. I do agree that the balance is skewed towards PvP though. That’s just lazy/frugal development though…its much easier to balance for one mode than to split time and resources for multiple modes. One can always dream of them sparing a little time to split a few skills.

“You make these assumptions on limited to no information about what players want…based apparently on your own predispositions”
^
you say this to me and do the same thing every time you post on this forum. Everyone does this. I could flip this 6 ways to Sunday and turn your own words right back on you.
Trust me im sure necro could use love in pve but that gain is not without some cost. In other places. Its clear the game is made around (WvW) and you sould come to face that fact. The changes to stability, the removal of bouncing bullets on thief, the changes to burning and poison stacking. (that last one is questionable to pve change) but i mean come on, these are just examples man. I love to play necro in pve but i don’t cry over not having 1 damage modifier that another profession may have. Not every profession is going to hit like a mac truck. Not every profession is going to take hits like a tank.

Necro has alot of changes that need to be done base line more than trait wise. Now get off my back. lol :P

The difference in assumptions here is that I don’t recall making blanket assumptions that the majority of players want the same thing I do. In fact, I often assume the opposite. I’m pretty sure I’m not alone in my opinions though..not by a long shot. That is based off of forum up votes though…not by blind assumptions. That being the case…these forums are not a true indicator of any majority as I can tell by the usual suspects…that it is a repeat post community other than when major stuff hits the fan. Again, pay attention to who replied to whom to start this reply chain and see who needs to get off who’s back.

anduriell.6280:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Forgetting Executioner’s Scythe? We have a buttload of Chill in Reaper’s Shroud thanks to that ice field and finishers. It’s very, very easy as a Reaper to have high Chill uptime.

Executioner’s Scythe only apply 1 second of chill that last the same as the Stun it applies. I think the chill there is just to give a nice touch to the skill more than actual utility.

In my tests i couldn’t get any uptime with chilled in gameplay, no theorycrafting here. The base of our chill uptime is the Chilling Scythe but that AA chain is so slow that your target is out of reach most of the times. I think i could land it like 10 times in pvE none in WvW.

Executioner’s Scythe pulses Chill with the ice field.

anduriell.6280:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Forgetting Executioner’s Scythe? We have a buttload of Chill in Reaper’s Shroud thanks to that ice field and finishers. It’s very, very easy as a Reaper to have high Chill uptime.

Executioner’s Scythe only apply 1 second of chill that last the same as the Stun it applies. I think the chill there is just to give a nice touch to the skill more than actual utility.

In my tests i couldn’t get any uptime with chilled in gameplay, no theorycrafting here. The base of our chill uptime is the Chilling Scythe but that AA chain is so slow that your target is out of reach most of the times. I think i could land it like 10 times in pvE none in WvW.

RS 5 + 4 creates a ton of chill (I think that is why there is a 5-stack limit, else you would chill AOE everyone for 1 min in 2 skills). One this combo is setup, applying future chill is easier. And let’s be honest, reaper is efficient enough to burst people down quite fast so your chill does not need to last that long.

I personally played conditions last BWE, so I tried instead staff 3 + RS 4 for insane poison stacking, and yet, I still managed to chill the enemy for a decent amount of time (I did use focus to setup the burst with chill + vuln).

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

anduriell.6280:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Forgetting Executioner’s Scythe? We have a buttload of Chill in Reaper’s Shroud thanks to that ice field and finishers. It’s very, very easy as a Reaper to have high Chill uptime.

Executioner’s Scythe only apply 1 second of chill that last the same as the Stun it applies. I think the chill there is just to give a nice touch to the skill more than actual utility.

In my tests i couldn’t get any uptime with chilled in gameplay, no theorycrafting here. The base of our chill uptime is the Chilling Scythe but that AA chain is so slow that your target is out of reach most of the times. I think i could land it like 10 times in pvE none in WvW.

Executioner’s Scythe pulses Chill with the ice field.

I dont think this is correct. Most of the chill should come from comboing the field (deathspiral and deaths charge for the frostarmor) not the field itself.

Muchacho.2390:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

anduriell.6280:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Forgetting Executioner’s Scythe? We have a buttload of Chill in Reaper’s Shroud thanks to that ice field and finishers. It’s very, very easy as a Reaper to have high Chill uptime.

Executioner’s Scythe only apply 1 second of chill that last the same as the Stun it applies. I think the chill there is just to give a nice touch to the skill more than actual utility.

In my tests i couldn’t get any uptime with chilled in gameplay, no theorycrafting here. The base of our chill uptime is the Chilling Scythe but that AA chain is so slow that your target is out of reach most of the times. I think i could land it like 10 times in pvE none in WvW.

Executioner’s Scythe pulses Chill with the ice field.

I dont think this is correct. Most of the chill should come from comboing the field (deathspiral and deaths charge for the frostarmor) not the field itself.

It is, actually. The Chill listed in the tooltip is based on the Ice Field, not the actual hit.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Muchacho.2390:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

anduriell.6280:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Forgetting Executioner’s Scythe? We have a buttload of Chill in Reaper’s Shroud thanks to that ice field and finishers. It’s very, very easy as a Reaper to have high Chill uptime.

Executioner’s Scythe only apply 1 second of chill that last the same as the Stun it applies. I think the chill there is just to give a nice touch to the skill more than actual utility.

In my tests i couldn’t get any uptime with chilled in gameplay, no theorycrafting here. The base of our chill uptime is the Chilling Scythe but that AA chain is so slow that your target is out of reach most of the times. I think i could land it like 10 times in pvE none in WvW.

Executioner’s Scythe pulses Chill with the ice field.

I dont think this is correct. Most of the chill should come from comboing the field (deathspiral and deaths charge for the frostarmor) not the field itself.

It is, actually. The Chill listed in the tooltip is based on the Ice Field, not the actual hit.

No i meant that the field doesnt pulse.

The stun and damage is single traget, the chill is aoe but it doesnt pulse.

Muchacho.2390:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Muchacho.2390:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

anduriell.6280:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Forgetting Executioner’s Scythe? We have a buttload of Chill in Reaper’s Shroud thanks to that ice field and finishers. It’s very, very easy as a Reaper to have high Chill uptime.

Executioner’s Scythe only apply 1 second of chill that last the same as the Stun it applies. I think the chill there is just to give a nice touch to the skill more than actual utility.

In my tests i couldn’t get any uptime with chilled in gameplay, no theorycrafting here. The base of our chill uptime is the Chilling Scythe but that AA chain is so slow that your target is out of reach most of the times. I think i could land it like 10 times in pvE none in WvW.

Executioner’s Scythe pulses Chill with the ice field.

I dont think this is correct. Most of the chill should come from comboing the field (deathspiral and deaths charge for the frostarmor) not the field itself.

It is, actually. The Chill listed in the tooltip is based on the Ice Field, not the actual hit.

No i meant that the field doesnt pulse.

The stun and damage is single traget, the chill is aoe but it doesnt pulse.

I could have sworn it was pulsing, but there’s no way to check that right now.

We can revisit this in a couple weeks when we can test.

Zenith.7301:

Since there’s no indication of buffing reaper shroud auto to not be a DPS loss over just autoattacking with greatsword let alone Gravedigger spam <50% health, the only PvE changes of note here are Soul Eater, which can now happily take the place of Reaper’s Onslaught since reaper shroud damage is bad in PvE.

The shouts will not be used in PvE, and developers seem happy with this outcome. I won’t bother since it’s clear by now we’re being told this set of utilities are not being balanced around PvE concerns.

The minors are still pretty terrible. Shivers of Dread are borderline useless in PvE, with the low availability of fear on power reaper to begin with, and 3 seconds of chill on fear being a mediocre effect, especially since bosses and champs are immune to Chill.

The change to Augury of Death will do nothing for PvE. I don’t understand how a 150 hp life steal is going to help against 10k+ damage from sniper shots in PvE. It follows a tradition of undertuned life steals in PvE. And since shouts are pretty much useless in PvE and will NOT be taken over Wells, we can move on to the last PvE relevant change.

Chilling Nova. A 50% damage increase on a 103 damage tooltip increase will still make for inconsequential damage on a 10 sec ICD in PvE. It will remain less damage than a single autoattack from any of our weapons, and the target count of the nova does nothing on PvE content where bosses are single targets.

And once again, we have no appropriate adepts to choose from in PvE. Augury of Death is useless because shouts are useless. Relentless Pursuit is useless in PvE content — the guardians and eles will be aoe removing conditions all the time in a group.

So we’re stuck with Chilling Nova, which still does a mediocre damage effect, and centers around a condition that any of the enemies of note, be they bosses or champs, are IMMUNE TO IN PVE.

Disappointing changes to be honest, especially with no buffs to reaper shroud autoattacks for PvE. We are balanced around PvP and will be stuck with a class mechanic that is a DPS loss, and by default Reaper’s Onslaught will be unattractive because of it.

None of these changes are particularly meaningful for PvE, the game format the class needs the most help with.

agree……seeing as i mostly play pve, these are pretty disappointing. seems this will remain a fun to play, but ineffective pve class.

ZDragon.3046:

ODB.6891:

Zenith.7301:

Since there’s no indication of buffing reaper shroud auto to not be a DPS loss over just autoattacking with greatsword let alone Gravedigger spam <50% health, the only PvE changes of note here are Soul Eater, which can now happily take the place of Reaper’s Onslaught since reaper shroud damage is bad in PvE.

The shouts will not be used in PvE, and developers seem happy with this outcome. I won’t bother since it’s clear by now we’re being told this set of utilities are not being balanced around PvE concerns.

The minors are still pretty terrible. Shivers of Dread are borderline useless in PvE, with the low availability of fear on power reaper to begin with, and 3 seconds of chill on fear being a mediocre effect, especially since bosses and champs are immune to Chill.

The change to Augury of Death will do nothing for PvE. I don’t understand how a 150 hp life steal is going to help against 10k+ damage from sniper shots in PvE. It follows a tradition of undertuned life steals in PvE. And since shouts are pretty much useless in PvE and will NOT be taken over Wells, we can move on to the last PvE relevant change.

Chilling Nova. A 50% damage increase on a 103 damage tooltip increase will still make for inconsequential damage on a 10 sec ICD in PvE. It will remain less damage than a single autoattack from any of our weapons, and the target count of the nova does nothing on PvE content where bosses are single targets.

And once again, we have no appropriate adepts to choose from in PvE. Augury of Death is useless because shouts are useless. Relentless Pursuit is useless in PvE content — the guardians and eles will be aoe removing conditions all the time in a group.

So we’re stuck with Chilling Nova, which still does a mediocre damage effect, and centers around a condition that any of the enemies of note, be they bosses or champs, are IMMUNE TO IN PVE.

Disappointing changes to be honest, especially with no buffs to reaper shroud autoattacks for PvE. We are balanced around PvP and will be stuck with a class mechanic that is a DPS loss, and by default Reaper’s Onslaught will be unattractive because of it.

None of these changes are particularly meaningful for PvE, the game format the class needs the most help with.

100% agree.

I partly agree with this only partly because if they start building to pve then pvp and wvw becomes a steaming pile Thus you still end up unhappy, for the most part it seems your concerns from these changes are a minority compared to the majority which feels that there is not a big issue with how the traits sit.

i’m sure the dozens of pvp players would be really upset if pve necro got some love (i ignore wvw because you can’t and don’t balance around wvw).

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Muchacho.2390:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Muchacho.2390:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

anduriell.6280:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Forgetting Executioner’s Scythe? We have a buttload of Chill in Reaper’s Shroud thanks to that ice field and finishers. It’s very, very easy as a Reaper to have high Chill uptime.

Executioner’s Scythe only apply 1 second of chill that last the same as the Stun it applies. I think the chill there is just to give a nice touch to the skill more than actual utility.

In my tests i couldn’t get any uptime with chilled in gameplay, no theorycrafting here. The base of our chill uptime is the Chilling Scythe but that AA chain is so slow that your target is out of reach most of the times. I think i could land it like 10 times in pvE none in WvW.

Executioner’s Scythe pulses Chill with the ice field.

I dont think this is correct. Most of the chill should come from comboing the field (deathspiral and deaths charge for the frostarmor) not the field itself.

It is, actually. The Chill listed in the tooltip is based on the Ice Field, not the actual hit.

No i meant that the field doesnt pulse.

The stun and damage is single traget, the chill is aoe but it doesnt pulse.

I could have sworn it was pulsing, but there’s no way to check that right now.

We can revisit this in a couple weeks when we can test.

Actually i could have sworn it wasnt pulsing in the bwe but i just looked at some reaper videos on youtube (you made me doubtful) and it actually seem to pulse…

So sry it seems i was wrong.

Sigmoid.7082:

Changes to chilling force mean you can take str runes and str/battle sigils and still maintain a lot of might without the spite line. So this opens up a few more build options. All these changes are perfect!

Id like to see how you manage that with breakbars making everything immune to chill, cripple etc.

spoj.9672:

Sigmoid.7082:

Changes to chilling force mean you can take str runes and str/battle sigils and still maintain a lot of might without the spite line. So this opens up a few more build options. All these changes are perfect!

Id like to see how you manage that with breakbars making everything immune to chill, cripple etc.

No player character has a break bar anymore and my post was pvp specific.

The changes look really good in my opinion apart from soul eater. I dont like the fact that now only gravedigger steals life. I think sustain wise this makes the trait actually worse then before.

Muchacho.2390:

The changes look really good in my opinion apart from soul eater. I dont like the fact that now only gravedigger steals life. I think sustain wise this makes the trait actually worse then before.

I do not know for sure until we try, but it does not sound that bad: when you start the fight, people have full health, you can’t spam gravedigger too much. But when your own life becomes low, you probably have someone else who is also low, so gravedigger spam starts. In a team fight, you may spend a lot of time spamming gravedigger because you need only 1 enemy below 50% for the recharge to activate.

So by putting it only on gravedigger but upping its value a lot, it MAY work actually better.

Muchacho.2390:

The changes look really good in my opinion apart from soul eater. I dont like the fact that now only gravedigger steals life. I think sustain wise this makes the trait actually worse then before.

I still wish they’d do something else. Blood magic is for stealing life. Reaper needs more access to standard Necromancer things.
I still Suggest:
- Soul Eater rips 2 boons per target hit. Heals for 100 per boon ripped.
- Augury of Death – Shouts ‘consume’ 1 (Or 2, but unfortunately, might be too strong as an adept with 2) conditions, healing 100 per condition consumed (only on self) and make it a 15% base cooldown reduction + 3% per target hit. (Total of 30%)

Reasons: Reaper loses a lot of base necromancer synergies that cover these gaps in curses(or Death, condition removal)/spite/SR. Adding a bit of boon removal to SE keeps some extra boon removal in the class but less corruption, saving that for more specialized trees. And consuming conditions adds some non-hit based (transfer) condition removal which the class could use.

ronpierce.2760:

I still wish they’d do something else. Blood magic is for stealing life. Reaper needs more access to standard Necromancer things.
I still Suggest:
- Soul Eater rips 2 boons per target hit. Heals for 100 per boon ripped.
- Augury of Death – Shouts ‘consume’ 1 (Or 2, but unfortunately, might be too strong as an adept with 2) conditions, healing 100 per condition consumed (only on self) and make it a 15% base cooldown reduction + 3% per target hit. (Total of 30%)

Reasons: Reaper loses a lot of base necromancer synergies that cover these gaps in curses(or Death, condition removal)/spite/SR. Adding a bit of boon removal to SE keeps some extra boon removal in the class but less corruption, saving that for more specialized trees. And consuming conditions adds some non-hit based (transfer) condition removal which the class could use.

I agree: we are flooded with life steals… When you hit something, you have so many numbers that you can hardly see how much damage you really do. Boon corruption would be nice, but too strong without iCD…

A couple comments on these changes:

Shroud: Seems nice with these changes, the reduction of the aftercast will make a huge difference. I still think the fear should be instant if its somehow possible to maintain balance, we still have 3 skills with rather long activations, making it rather impossible to use the fear reliably to counter some faster enemy skills while youre in the middle of an animation, the change helps a bit but does not fix this problem.

Greatsword: Will be okay. The changes help a bit with useability but my main concern with this weapon is that i dont feel dangerous at all unless an enemy has to fight me on a point. I cant generate good pressure against kiting enemys or ranged enemys at all compared to similar weapons in the game our chills and pulls dont give us an reliable benefit like a leap would.

Shouts: Are getting decent for the most part. Suffer is still bad for what it does. Conditional scaling condi clear that can be blocked on a long cooldown. Unless similar condi clears this feels really bad when you need a condi clear and no enemys are in range, or when fighting against a single target that is specced for conditions this skill is still more then useless. The skill is even then only “okay” when fighting multiple targets.

Traits:
Augury is way better that way. The lifesteal seems to be too weak with 100-150, but we will see. Souleater the CD reduction part seems much more usefull now. I dont know about the lifesteal here though, it can heal a lot when hitting 5 targets and when one is under 50%, but then again in most of these situations you already have the upper hand and you wouldnt need more sustain. I will also miss the synergy with the multiple hits from skill 3 and 4 this trait got before.

Random other notes:

Shivers of Dread feels so wasted, as reaper only has 1 native fear skill on its skillset. Staff and Spectral Wall could benefit as well, but why should i pick Spectral Wall as utility skill? Now if Spectral Wall would block projectiles i could at least defend myself against ranged attacks but…. Could we give this trait a little bit love? Maybe like “Your healskill also Chills nearby foes for 2 seconds” or “Gain protection when a chilled foe hits you 3s 15s icd” Its a master minor after all…

Please make darkfields and whirlfinishers work with shroud. So much wasted potential here that makes my brain bleed.

anduriell.6280:

ZDragon.3046:

anduriell.6280:

The changes look amazing , thanks Robert!!

But i still miss chill application on crit (33% chance?) because right now in game there is no way of a reliable source of chill and i think with the cast times of the GS t would be a great help.
A little changes in the minor traits would be good:

• Shivers of dread : apply slow (1 sec) on Foes you chill (1/2 sec ICD).
• Cold Shoulder: apply chill on crit 33% chance 2 seconds. Remove the longer chill duration,

This could make the landing of GS skills a bit easier and actually possible.
Also having a reliable source of chill will help to make the reduced damage from chilled foes actually be useful.
I think 1 second of slow plus 2 seconds of chill 1/3 of the time you crit is not much but helps.
To compare how much could a Reaper proc the minor BAreber precision in Curses proc bleedng the same way.

EWWW NO GET OUT WITH THAT!

leave the chill duration alone whats wrong with you lol. You say there is not enough chill in reaper. You are crazy and clearly dont play necro.

i do actually play necro.
My reasoning for asking for slow and more chill are those (Not having in mind reaper skills):

• We only have 2 weapon skills in LONG COOLDOWN that apply chill: staff and focus.
• GS does chill only with 2 skills: Chilling scyte (impossible to land) and Grasping darkness (30 CD).
• We only have ONE utility skill that chill outside of shouts. Spectral Grasp (30 secs CD).
• Suffer! is the only shout that apply chill aside from the elite. 30 secs CD
• Necro does not apply blind, i think in total it has 2 weapon skills that do.

GS skill have a very long cast for weapon skills and Reaper shourd is melee only so suffer stronger attrition than the DS, burning the LF really quick.
Even with the sigil (2 secs chill with 10 secs ICD) or runes (4 secs chill with 30 secs ICD) you could get at max around 10 secs of chill. 20% of that is 2 seconds more and that is not much and i’m talking about the best situation possible that it will never happen.

So although the reaper depends a lot in the chilled condition it only have few ways to apply it. Slow is thematically correct as the monsters in the movies seems to affect their pray making them slower in reaction also (When Jason walks around with the machete and people just stare as him is cutting he way thru for example).

Also It’s a way to get better survivability as slow ins an active defense, that also fits with the necro mechanics itself.

The difference with the mesmer would be in this case, mesme apply slow in ranged AoE while Reaper is mostly focused for melee and single target. The AoE chills from the shouts wouldn’t change much because it would be just 1 second of Slow to one target let’s not forget the ICD i’m proposing what mostly wouldn’t be advertised for the targets (for example the stun from the elite is 1 second longer than the hypothetical slow duration)

Otherwise i don’t see the GS being used much anywhere.

+1000

Reaper chill access is bad. In order to be decent, chill has to last long enough for you to engage a foe and then hit a foe.

A lot of access to 2 second chills doesn’t cut it.

Literally every chill that the reaper/necromancer has is 1-2 seconds too short, except maybe DS2.

While we’re at it, thief stolen chill is too short/inconsequential as well.

Is permanent chill uptime OP? No. Ranger has/had it. Elementalist has it. Necromancer has it.

Chill, even 100% uptime chill, doesn’t make a difference vs some classes, (Thieves are immune to chill), but it helps a lot against other classes. These are the classes that the Necromancer is supposed to be countering, but are only 50/50 !

As for Slow, that condition is a 100% copy of Faintheartedness which was a necromancer hex.

Curses Necromancers should be masters of slow (I made a suggestion in the other thread to put Slow on Scepter as part of reworked Lingering Curse).

Silverkey.2078:

ronpierce.2760:

I still wish they’d do something else. Blood magic is for stealing life. Reaper needs more access to standard Necromancer things.
I still Suggest:
- Soul Eater rips 2 boons per target hit. Heals for 100 per boon ripped.
- Augury of Death – Shouts ‘consume’ 1 (Or 2, but unfortunately, might be too strong as an adept with 2) conditions, healing 100 per condition consumed (only on self) and make it a 15% base cooldown reduction + 3% per target hit. (Total of 30%)

Reasons: Reaper loses a lot of base necromancer synergies that cover these gaps in curses(or Death, condition removal)/spite/SR. Adding a bit of boon removal to SE keeps some extra boon removal in the class but less corruption, saving that for more specialized trees. And consuming conditions adds some non-hit based (transfer) condition removal which the class could use.

I agree: we are flooded with life steals… When you hit something, you have so many numbers that you can hardly see how much damage you really do. Boon corruption would be nice, but too strong without iCD…

We are not flooded with lifesteals, its just how they work. Revenant for example also has 2 lifesteals, both make a good impact, the minor lifesteal is almost as potent as our entire bloodmagic line in that regards and the grandmaster lifesteal can be really really really good, its situational but really potent. Id like to see something similar, not especially on reaper, but for the base class as well.

Silverkey.2078:

ronpierce.2760:

I still wish they’d do something else. Blood magic is for stealing life. Reaper needs more access to standard Necromancer things.
I still Suggest:
- Soul Eater rips 2 boons per target hit. Heals for 100 per boon ripped.
- Augury of Death – Shouts ‘consume’ 1 (Or 2, but unfortunately, might be too strong as an adept with 2) conditions, healing 100 per condition consumed (only on self) and make it a 15% base cooldown reduction + 3% per target hit. (Total of 30%)

Reasons: Reaper loses a lot of base necromancer synergies that cover these gaps in curses(or Death, condition removal)/spite/SR. Adding a bit of boon removal to SE keeps some extra boon removal in the class but less corruption, saving that for more specialized trees. And consuming conditions adds some non-hit based (transfer) condition removal which the class could use.

I agree: we are flooded with life steals… When you hit something, you have so many numbers that you can hardly see how much damage you really do. Boon corruption would be nice, but too strong without iCD…

Ah, not sure what I was thinking, totally slipped my mind on how broken this would be sub 50%.
Perhaps a single boon corrupt would be a better choice than a double removal. Still makes it strong under 50%, but that’s assuming you and each hit and isn’t completely rendering boons null under 50%. I would rather a less powerful effect than an ICD though. ICDs muddy gameplay imo.

Brujeria.7536:

Shivers of Dread feels so wasted, as reaper only has 1 native fear skill on its skillset. Staff and Spectral Wall could benefit as well, but why should i pick Spectral Wall as utility skill?.

Please merge Chilling Darkness onto shivers of dread. Adding one reaper native blind onto one reaper native fear doesn’t seem so OP for a grandmaster minor.

Plus the trait has been pre nerfed to work with reaper skills.

Brujeria.7536:

snip the stuff I’m not responding to.

Greatsword: Will be okay. The changes help a bit with useability but my main concern with this weapon is that i dont feel dangerous at all unless an enemy has to fight me on a point. I cant generate good pressure against kiting enemys or ranged enemys at all compared to similar weapons in the game our chills and pulls dont give us an reliable benefit like a leap would.

Shouts: Are getting decent for the most part. Suffer is still bad for what it does. Conditional scaling condi clear that can be blocked on a long cooldown. Unless similar condi clears this feels really bad when you need a condi clear and no enemys are in range, or when fighting against a single target that is specced for conditions this skill is still more then useless. The skill is even then only “okay” when fighting multiple targets.

Random other notes:

Shivers of Dread feels so wasted, as reaper only has 1 native fear skill on its skillset. Staff and Spectral Wall could benefit as well, but why should i pick Spectral Wall as utility skill? Now if Spectral Wall would block projectiles i could at least defend myself against ranged attacks but…. Could we give this trait a little bit love? Maybe like “Your healskill also Chills nearby foes for 2 seconds” or “Gain protection when a chilled foe hits you 3s 15s icd” Its a master minor after all…

Please make darkfields and whirlfinishers work with shroud. So much wasted potential here that makes my brain bleed.

I think GS would be OK, being extremely slow if dagger 3 got changed to a port, they buffed walk to be a port, and/or they lowered the cast on wurm a lot. Basically, it would be okay if we had other mobility options.

I agree, suffer really needs to remove a condi or two by default, and then add condi transfers per target hit.

Remember, there are a ton of ways necros can get fear, boon corruption, reaper’s protection, and nightmare runes are a few you forgot. Also, spectral wall isn’t bad with reaper shroud. You get a leap for chaos armor, and you can get a lot of confusion with a whirl. It could still use a lower CD or something else, but it isn’t bad.

Reaper interaction with fields is my main complaint at this point. Leaping through dark to get a blind that we already get with the leap. Siphoning bolts that don’t siphon cause they don’t work in shroud. Having well of darkness which is just an inferior nightfall. They should change well of darkness to well of ice, that would be way cooler, and give us another aoe chill option to be less dependent on staff.

So, Chilling Nova is now Sigil of Fire + Sigil of Ice in terms of what it does… The buff to damage probably doesn’t do enough to make a difference on a rabid condi spec, but if it let us break diamond skin, that would be amazing. The problem with Chilling Nova is that it feels extremely random. I’m not sure, but does it compete with Sigils and traits for the on critical proc? If so, it competes with Sigil of torment and barbed precision.

Silverkey.2078:

Muchacho.2390:

The changes look really good in my opinion apart from soul eater. I dont like the fact that now only gravedigger steals life. I think sustain wise this makes the trait actually worse then before.

I do not know for sure until we try, but it does not sound that bad: when you start the fight, people have full health, you can’t spam gravedigger too much. But when your own life becomes low, you probably have someone else who is also low, so gravedigger spam starts. In a team fight, you may spend a lot of time spamming gravedigger because you need only 1 enemy below 50% for the recharge to activate.

So by putting it only on gravedigger but upping its value a lot, it MAY work actually better.

Nah i am sure it wont work better. A value of 140-180 per target is not much for a slow hitting skill like gravedigger. The old version plus death spiral alone gives probably more lifesteal in most situations. The only situation were this could be better is when you can spam gd. Also something that is really unreliable in spvp.

Life steals need to be % based on damage done. 5-10% life steal on damage done would probably be a lot more valuable.

The lifesteals are too minuscule to be worthwhile in most game formats. Regen alone tends to heal more than the lifesteals, and regen is considered the weakest healing source and one of the weakest boons in the game to begin with.

nekretaal.6485:

Brujeria.7536:

Shivers of Dread feels so wasted, as reaper only has 1 native fear skill on its skillset. Staff and Spectral Wall could benefit as well, but why should i pick Spectral Wall as utility skill?.

Please merge Chilling Darkness onto shivers of dread. Adding one reaper native blind onto one reaper native fear doesn’t seem so OP for a grandmaster minor.

Plus the trait has been pre nerfed to work with reaper skills.

That’s what I had mentioned before. No one without reaper (ok maybe very few) use Chilli g Darkness anymore since it was nerfed for reaper. The least they could do is merge it into Shivers of Dread, which is currently pretty useless, and just make it proc from either Blind or Fear with a 4 or 5 second ICD. Then we’d at least have a good enough chill for while we’re actually in shroud so we’re not kited into oblivion.

Good changes overall.

But why isn’t anything being done about Deathly Chill not working on bosses and most mobs in HoT? Well, tbf it’s not just Deathly Chill. Since Chill doesn’t affect any mobs with a breakbar, many of our skills are essentially useless against them. This makes me really sad.

Robert, since Shambling Horrors are getting a unique model, is there any chance you could poke the art team about giving Jagged Horrors a unique model as well instead of sharing it with Bone Minions?

We would also love some info on the planned scepter and axe changes if possible

To the people wondering, RS5 ice field pulses. At least it did in the last BWE.

Might be a bit late but I’d like to see Chilling Nova as an “on entering RS” trait. I bet I’d look really nice and take the crit RNG out. Not sure about potential balance issues though.

Lastly, a question for Robert Gee.
Is it intended that you cannot break the stuns on Executioner’s Scythe and “Chilled to the Bone!”? Due to them placing “Reaper’s Frost” instead of a normal stun onto the target I mean.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

anduriell.6280:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Forgetting Executioner’s Scythe? We have a buttload of Chill in Reaper’s Shroud thanks to that ice field and finishers. It’s very, very easy as a Reaper to have high Chill uptime.

Executioner’s Scythe only apply 1 second of chill that last the same as the Stun it applies. I think the chill there is just to give a nice touch to the skill more than actual utility.

In my tests i couldn’t get any uptime with chilled in gameplay, no theorycrafting here. The base of our chill uptime is the Chilling Scythe but that AA chain is so slow that your target is out of reach most of the times. I think i could land it like 10 times in pvE none in WvW.

Executioner’s Scythe pulses Chill with the ice field.

Sorry it seems it does. The icefield left behind is AoE for 5 seconds?
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQRBLRhG2IHN0cjV2g3NwfjEAAIGA-e

But it doesn’t matter, we are talking of another skill in 30 seconds CD.
Even with AoE, with the 1/2 (or 1 ) second ICD, that will make the same effect as sigil of fire and piercing arrows: you proc the sigil the first objective and then enters the ICD, so it does not affect the other mobs.

Same with this Slow application, Slow in AoE chill still will only affect one mob, the first one to be affected by the chill.

This will make more punishing to be the first to get in close combat with the reaper, no making much a difference if there are more than one mobs within the attack effect. Also it depends mostly in your crit chance, because as i said the reaper can not proc perma chill being the best case 1/3.

As i said, the problem with the reaper right now is that it depends exclusively in one trait and is a must to have an ele or shout guardian in your team and closed by to be viable in PvP, and that’s a problem having in mind that the meta classes do not need other team mates to hold themselves in a fight. The point that any enemy can disengage and reset the fight just walking away is not a plus because the reaper can not regenerate the LF without hits.

The slow and chill application will make at least to one target to stick with us and make more difficult to reset the fight. It won’t save you in a zerg, but in small scale fights would give more freedom to the trait lines you want to choose.

Right now i could say Soul reaping is a must because the reaper does not have any kind of real defence, not passive and definitely not active. Even then the LF in RS is just burns so fast against any burst… So in reality you only have the freedom to choose one trait line.

But hey i love the reaper in his actual state. Just pointing out how to make the GS work.

Robert Gee.9246:

ZudetGambeous.9573:

Additionally, can you comment on Deathly Chill? This skill currently doesn’t work on 90% of PvE enemies. Any update on this?

I think the new icon will help with this. The damage is probably getting lost with the other attacks.

When you need an icon to see the effect of your grandmaster trait, it means something went wrong. I tried the trait in pve with a spite/curses/reaper build, It was rabid but I had some nice might stacks. This is what happed to me:
foe above 50% health
- condition damage is ramping up nothing, casting chill is too weak at the moment.
foe below 50% health
- Time for my chills. Chill of death + chilling nova procced. 2 seconds later enemy dead.

This may be a (little) exageration but it shows the problem clearly for PvE: Conditions is an executioner due to ramp up time, spite is an executioner due to health thresholds. Add deathly chill’s own executioner style due to it’s threshold. They all shorten the time they are effective while doing little to nothing to the ramp up time. So maybe just drop the threshold for it or make it more bearable (66%~75%).

Reaper’s Shroud – Great changes. Particularly Death’s Charge. The removal of aftercast on the AA chain should also make it feel a bit smoother, and while I never really had a problem with it before, that’s nice.

Greatsword – Nightfall changes are very nice. Didn’t even realize AA were bugged, but fixes are good especially if they help performance at the same time. I’ve never really had a problem hitting with Death Spiral as a dirty PvE casual, but I won’t say no to hitting even more stuff!

Shouts – Ah, lots of great stuff in here. Cooldown reductions are fantastic. I’m not really up with all the terms and maths used for the Your Soul is Mine changes, but I’m assuming it implies an overall buff. Which I am definitely happy about. Unique Rise models is very nice, I love me some aesthetics. Love the buffs to You are All Weaklings, though I still feel the stunbreak would feel better on Suffer (or both) as I want to use YAAW as often as possible, not keep it in my pocket for when I need a stunbreak.

Augury of Death – Awesome, very happy to see a secondary effect added to this trait besides just cooldown reduction. Was kind of hoping for something a little more interesting, but the health steal fits the overall Shout theme and every little bit helps, so I’ll take it.

Chilling Nova – Never really played with this trait, but sounds like a solid change.

Chilling Force – So its now a more AoE-rewarding trait. Ok. Might be a slight overall nerf, but it again fits a theme and could be better in some situations as well. Interesting.

Soul Eater – I kind of liked the idea behind the old cooldown reduction, but no doubt this will be far more useful as a whole (and I’m still of the opinion that the old one didn’t always work anyway). Life stealing change I like. The life steal was basically only useful with 2 skills before, but even though its been reduced to literally only work with 1 skill, that skill is central to the weapon and can be used to good effect, so it seems like it’ll help in the long run. Looking forward to testing it out.

Overall, some really good stuff. There’s of course still room the improve, as always, but its good stuff. Reaper is probably getting my “best changes from BWE” award. Again.

So being that the reapers roll is supposed to be front line DPS support. It will still not have a spot in PVE or PVP because of the lack of Stab.

Sharen Graves.1276:

So being that the reapers roll is supposed to be front line DPS support. It will still not have a spot in PVE or PVP because of the lack of Stab.

Uhm…right. Let’s ignore the 11 seconds of 1-3 stacks stab on RS #3 with a 20 second cd base that can be brought down with Soul Reaping. It also has some stability on the elite shout, which, I admit is on a rather lengthy CD. And you could take Foot in the Grave for a potential 6 second CD stunbreak and 1 stack of stab on entering RS (again, yes I admit 1 stack is kinda bad).

Point is, it doesn’t really matter in PvE as long as you can dodge or soak it in RS, and FitG + Fleeting shadows and the 2 dodges should be enough to “tank” any CC the mobs throw at you, as long as they do not get a special skill that takes 2 stacks of stab to block. With decimate defenses you could trade the Soul reaping crit trait for FitG without problems as long as you compensate for it with taking a mixed bag of defensive gear and gear with precision, or make up for it with food.

As for sPvP, let’s see how it turns out. Last beta I had 0 problems with the tools provided, but last beta people also let me hit Executioners Scythe consistently because they aren’t used to the tell yet, soo…

And WvW… Never played it before (can sb. maybe tell me if I can even make a meaningful impact w/o Ascended Gear?), but I’d imagine roaming and flipping camps should be better than with base Necro, while in Zerg blobs you should propably really stick to playing a well bomber.

And that’d be totally fine. “awesome” in PvE, pretty kitten good in sPvP, better left alone in WvW Zerging compared to base Necro’s “awesome” in WvW blobs, decent to good in sPvP, mediocre in PvE – sounds like it is working as intended, what with them pretty much compensating each other

Great overall. I can finally see Necro becoming Meta.

However, Chilled to the Bone is still REALLY weak as a 2s stun on 90s cd, and Soul Eater still needs adjustments, since there’s not enough reason to use it over Decimate Defenses.

So I took a look at the damage numbers for Chilling Nova on a condi spec. It definitely won’t be breaking a diamond skin. The trait that is supposed to be great for the condi chill spec is not that great for a condi chill spec…

Controversial suggestion: Can you please nerf the other classes applying chill?

Currently, Necromancer kind of needs a niche. Chill itself is a very interesting effect that can make a difference (66% less super attacks), but the reason it’s not wanted in pve is because other classes can apply small amounts of chill just by their normal damage rotations. In group settings, where 2 elementalists and an engineer are all using their chill skills, they are able to maintain a lot of coverage with chill, and this kind of makes the Necromancer’s chill application incredibly unneeded.

Cecilia.5179:

So I took a look at the damage numbers for Chilling Nova on a condi spec. It definitely won’t be breaking a diamond skin. The trait that is supposed to be great for the condi chill spec is not that great for a condi chill spec…

It wouldn’t break Diamond Skin anyway, because it’s a condition.

To clarify my nerf suggestion for Chill on other classes:

Ice Bow. PLZ NERF ICE BOW.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Frost_Fan

2-4 people using this, 20s of chill on a boss, without much of a dps loss, AND the strongest burst in the game.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Cecilia.5179:

So I took a look at the damage numbers for Chilling Nova on a condi spec. It definitely won’t be breaking a diamond skin. The trait that is supposed to be great for the condi chill spec is not that great for a condi chill spec…

It wouldn’t break Diamond Skin anyway, because it’s a condition.

I was talking about the sigil of fire style on proc damage they boosted and how it doesn’t do anything for the condi specs who were probably the only ones even using Chilling Nova.

Cecilia.5179:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Cecilia.5179:

So I took a look at the damage numbers for Chilling Nova on a condi spec. It definitely won’t be breaking a diamond skin. The trait that is supposed to be great for the condi chill spec is not that great for a condi chill spec…

It wouldn’t break Diamond Skin anyway, because it’s a condition.

I was talking about the sigil of fire style on proc damage they boosted and how it doesn’t do anything for the condi specs who were probably the only ones even using Chilling Nova.

That couldn’t break Diamond Skin anyway because it requires the person you crit to already be chilled. Which, if Diamond Skin is intact, they aren’t.

Please Robert do something about the Soul Reaping grandmaster traits.
1- There is no point in taking Decimate Defenses and Deaths Perception cause it makes buffs like banners spotter fury etc go to waste.
2- Out of both of them Decimate Defenses is clearly superior seeing how it affects you both in shroud and out of it. At least in PvE its better.
3- As a result out of the 3 grandmaster traits only one benefits its condi dps and none benefits its power dps.
Please do something about them cause the Soul Reaping trait line is kinda mandatory and none except for Dhuumfire add dps which is according to you guys the way a necromancer benefits a party and that trait only affects condi dps.
I would love seeing something like “While in shroud you deal X% more physical and condi dmg” or something like what warrior has “When you use shroud deal X% more dmg for X secs”.
Also as a side note Foot in the Grave seems kinda underpowered, using shroud only as a stun break and stab is really limiting of its true potential.

Robert Gee.9246:

Shiki.7148:

Now can we please have CttB work under water please? I really want to be able to run something other than Plagueform.

I’m not sure if this change will be in BWE3 (been making changes in a lot of different places) but I’m intending for all shouts to be usable underwater.

ZudetGambeous.9573:

Additionally, can you comment on Deathly Chill? This skill currently doesn’t work on 90% of PvE enemies. Any update on this?

I think the new icon will help with this. The damage is probably getting lost with the other attacks.

Just to be clear, are you saying we will apply a different condition at the same time as the chill so it will affect enemies with breakbars? Or is this just to make our damage easier to see? Or are you saying even when chill didn’t work on bosses we should still see deathly chill damage ticks but we were just missing them in the clutter of the combat log? The latter is certainly a possibility, that thing scrolls fast lol.