Guild Wars 2

“You may have noticed that the 5th slot for Death Shroud is empty now, we intend to add one more skill…” they said… “leave some suggestions on what that skill might be…” they said…

How can i not take advantage of such an opportunity… You know me, i’m all over that…

I think this skill will complete the necromancer and will make him more or less on par with any strong PvP class (at least as a conditionmancer)… as well as giving the one last thing missing for PvE. It would be more or less… perfect…

Guild Wars 2 – Necromancer’s Death Shroud skill 5 [suggestion]

The community agreed for the most part with the my suggestion for the necromancer’s Death Shroud 5 skill. Yet ArenaNet wants a condition that they can share with a few other classes…

Some were expecting that i modify and adjust my Death Shroud skill 5 so that it can be used for multiple classes… yet i argued that this can not be. Adding a new condition into the game for multiple classes will most likely imbalance the game…

… and then it hit me !

Guild Wars 2 – Necromancer’s Death Shroud skill 5 [suggestion] – part II: Madness

Feel free to leave any suggestions on my suggestion… or any feedback.

Are you kidding me? Post your suggestion in one of the other threads and don`t post a youtube link. Post it as an additive or something.

Soulutions.6450:

Are you kidding me? Post your suggestion in one of the other threads and don`t post a youtube link. Post it as an additive or something.

Are you with the ArenaNet dev team ?

I just finished watching your entire video and I have to say I’ve very impressed. You managed to keep it simple yet address some very important issues of necromancer attrition while making it available to any build. You really thought deep into how the class works and came up with a REASONABLE suggestion unlike some people with their crazy fantasy’s.

I hope that you suggestion gets accepted and you have my full support as a necromancer loving player.

Nemesis.8593:

Soulutions.6450:

Are you kidding me? Post your suggestion in one of the other threads and don`t post a youtube link. Post it as an additive or something.

Are you with the ArenaNet dev team ?

you have to admit, he has kind of a point. why a new thread for that suggestion? there already are multiple threads about suggestions for the 5th ability and condition

Because
1) He’s Nemesis. He has already gotten a few suggestions into the game, and is one of the biggest people in the Necro community.
2) This is a very well thought out, in depth look over not just what his specific implementation is, but how it should be looked at in general.
3) This is pretty much how he always does things. He doesn’t really write guides, he makes videos.

Life drain dot that heals HP while in death shroud and can be stacked similar to bleed.

-It will help power and condi, (I play power myself)…condition a little more, but power is already ahead in terms of DS.
-Helps the attrition concept immensely.
-Helps vs. high evasion and mobility builds as an instant similar to scepter swipes that’s spammable.

I heard most of the video and the heal on removal portion is interesting, this suggestion is really similar to what I’ve been saying.

I think there’s a tradeoff of reliability vs. a straight life drain depending on whether the condi gets removed or not with Nemesis’ suggestion but I could see it being more useful vs. a burst scenario.

Posted on a similar thread, I would like a skill that works on enemy boons. Boons like Aegis and Stability could be stolen like a Thief giving better access for Necromancer.

@Nemesis: Like your suggestion very much. You put a lot of thought into it.

Necromancer does not need a lot of improvement in PvE but PvP could use help to counteract some of the class imbalance.

Edit——-
After further consideration, I still like the idea of somehow getting stability off of #5 but also like the idea of healing the main pool of HP, as Nemesis suggests. Whether eating boons, conditions, or a little of both, getting a little heal and stability in wvw would help that aspect of Necromancer without doing much in PvE.

Many like I had complained quite some time ago about the lack of a unique condition only Necromancers would have, even if it was more of an annoyance to enemy players than anything else. I do hope that is true. As a profession with low combat mobility, we need something that forces other players away, like Fear. A new condition that, say, forces the enemy to lose target lock, or forces the lock onto an ally (again, just to be an annoyance), could change the game play in pvp without creating a damage or heal imbalance favoring Necromancer.

Nemesis, as always, you’ve impressed me and I greatly hope that this skill is used/implemented/adjusted in some way.
Also you are a handsome fellow.

Actually a pretty good idea , would benefit every build and the attrition theme.
However 2 things come to my mind:

- This condition will not be necro exclusive (as stated in the SOTG).
Other professions will get this condition too, and i think its a bit too much constructed around the Necro theme.
It would help with necro problems nice though, but other professions would get this attrition tool as well, which basicly can nullify its effects in PVP /WVW settings

- We can not be healed while in Deathshroud. So i would feel kinda forced to leave Deathshroud after using it to make sure I get a guaranteed benefit in case of fast removal.

I like the idea alot. Addresses the same things i wanted improved, but in a different way to my idea. I wanted to sacrifice life force for some health. This provides attrition in certain situations and also gives a nice dps boost. So id definately be happy if this is what the devs go for.

ArenaNet please listen to Nemesis. I realy think this suggestion will make necromanser stronger but at the same time not OP.

I am keeping a close eye on this thread, and reading what you guys are saying…

@ We can not be healed while in Deathshroud. So i would feel kinda forced to leave Deathshroud after using it to make sure I get a guaranteed benefit in case of fast removal.

Well that’s the fun of it… you the necromancer have to manage that = skill, the opponent has to decide if and when to remove this condition to get the upper hand in combat = skill… if he removes it too soon you get healed and maybe kill him, if it lets id do it’s damage maybe you combo chain fear and it’s enough to kill him a few dozen seconds later… = a lot of skill on both sides.

Also i wanted to bring into discussion something that someone said on youtube:
“I can see this? getting ridiculousness. Corrupt boon a guardian > soul eater > epidemic. With the making of corrupt boon unblock-able that would be the preferred skill order.”

Getting back to the math on the scenario simulation… you remember that your bleeding damage in terms of DPS is around 1000, you get to 3500 with the help of golem worm and fear… So if you spread the bleeds and soul eater the 5 players around will get 2%, 4%, 8% and 16% of 1000 damage extra. That will be first second 1020, 1040, 1080, 1160… DPS.

The genius of this idea is that it does not get out of hand… even if spread… at the same time if all 5 targets cleanse you at the wrong time, you get 3x (20 + 40 + 80 +160) x5 targets = 4500 health back. That is when you spread an average of 10 bleeds on 5 targets with 1400 condition damage, and they all get dispelled at the wrong time…

If 5 targets totally nullify your efforts and you are back to nothing, you should get something for it… and now you do. You get exactly what the class is suppose to have, more attrition vs 5 targets. You think that having a 4500 heal, that requires such a high skill cap to obtain, is OP ? Do you really ?…

At the same time it’s more beneficial in 1v1 fights… since you have damages from multiple sources – golem, flesh worm, fear…

The more i think of it, the more i think this is what necromancer was missing all along.

edit: i can be a little OP for WvW, since you would have a lot more condition damage and the heal grows exponentially depending on bleed stacks, and since epidemic spreads much better in WvW… but then again, the numbers can be adjusted… the skill can be tweaked to fit this particular exception in which it may get out of hand.

I like the idea of the attrition condition. I think i would rather it be a pbae spell that can’t be epidemic-ed. Epidemic is overused as it is and in this implementation would almost force people to use Epidemic which would be bad.

My contribution to this would be to make it a skill that increases your dps by a flat % for every second the condition is left on the target.

Pbae condition 5 target max. 40 second cooldown duration 10 seconds. For each second that the condition is left results in a 1 % dps increase. In the event of a cleanse the dps boost goes to 15% for the duration of the skill.

Normal Cleansed at 3 seconds
1. 1% 1. 2%
2. 2% 2. 4%
3. 3% 3. 6%
4. 4% 4. 15%
5. 5% 5. 15%
6. 6% 6. 15%
7. 7% 7. 15%
8. 8% 8. 15%
9. 9% 9. 15%
10. 10% 10. 15%

Something like this would help all specs of necromancer by forcing classes to think about condi removal, and choose when to use their removal wisely. It will make the mass condi clears have some drawback instead of none.

Here is a different idea for a new condition – reduce total attack or just power. Call it Feaver, if you like. It could effectively take a % off Power and/or Precision

It occurred to me this morning that a condition which degraded precision would reduce the chance of critical hit. That would have a large effect on builds in all professions if the % reduction was not small.

Another related condition is to simply reduce the critical hit bonus by, for example, 2% per stack of this condition. Now, with Necromancer’s DS, I do not expect there to be stacks on anyone so maybe the reduction can be relatively large; like 20%. However, if that were to happen, then perhaps just reducing precision by, say, 200, for a few seconds may be simpler and fairer.

Anchoku.8142:

It occurred to me this morning that a condition which degraded precision would reduce the chance of critical hit. That would have a large effect on builds in all professions if the % reduction was not small.

Another related condition is to simply reduce the critical hit bonus by, for example, 2% per stack of this condition. Now, with Necromancer’s DS, I do not expect there to be stacks on anyone so maybe the reduction can be relatively large; like 20%. However, if that were to happen, then perhaps just reducing precision by, say, 200, for a few seconds may be simpler and fairer.

What would this do for PvE ?… What would this do for any and all PvP enemy builds that have no precision… like bunkers and healers ?

You are correct this would do less against bunkers and healers. The suggestion was for a new condition similar to Weakness, Chill, Blind and so forth so I wondered what Arenanet might be thinking of. The gw2guru interview made it sound more like that sort of condition. Just because Necromancer is getting a new condition in the 5th DS slot does not mean it will be exclusive to the profession.

In fact, it is a good exercise reviewing each of the current conditions and boons and matching them to their opposites or to skills. For example, Chill’s opposite is Time Warp and Stability’s opposite is the various knock-downs and knock-backs as well as Fear.

If I really, really wanted to dream, I might suggest a condition affecting Defiant or Invulnerability.

I fail to see how a minion themed 5th ability would not work for power or condition builds, or even how thats relevant.
As it stands 2 of deathshrouds abilities are not effected by condition damage, another one barely is cause of the couple stacks of bleed, and the other one (fear) is only if you have traited terror…so deathshroud isnt condition damage friendly to start.

This may be a problem with deathshroud as a whole, and may be why they want to put in a condition damage themed ability to balance things out i dunno but that aside…

Reason why i think a pet themed ability would be better, as just like other pets….it doesnt matter what stats your running, it always does its damage or whatever its meant to do. Sure if you invest in traits towards them, you benefit more, but minions are always helping you regardless of stats and thus are always equally beneficial no matter what your wearing.

I think summoner is a pretty core theme of the necromancer. We have far more traits that help or spawn minions than any other utilitys. Even 2 of our 3 elites can spawn minions. TBH i would prefer much like the mesmer, that each weapon’s 4th ability spawned some kind of minion even if the minion was there just to cast chill or heal etc, as focusing it would give some counter play. So naturally i wanna see more minion use in the game. I think it would fit well and make most players happy BUT they said they were leaning towards a dark themed condition, so best put that idea on hold.

As for your ability, i dont think anything should not be dodgeable. Right away that is a huge flaw in your suggestion, best to stay away from that idea entirely…i dont think any ability on any profession should dip into this or need this to be effective.

Also, this condition would get scary due to how it is calculated with another damage amp condition….vulnerability. Is the damage % increase after vulnerability multiplicatively or additionally? Have you given any thoughts to this, we happen to be very good at increasing damage through vulnerability already.

Also you suggested an animation but i didnt catch whether you said what the cast time would be. By suggestiong an animation i’m assuming its not instant? Also i’m not sure how strong this ability will be outside the daze. Most professions can just dodge, turn invisable, invuln, block etc for the next 3 seconds…chance are you would always use this ablity at the start of your rotation of skills for maximum damage, throwing this out would be a big flag saying “i’m about to do mean things to you” allowing them to ignore it entirely.

I like the daze, and the condition that punishes you for removing it….but thats about all i’m liking about it atm. You start out about saying how your ideas are simple and not outlandish then you immidiatly suggest its not dodgeable….if you have a problem with dodgers, perhaps that needs addressed in another way.

^ Conditions do not scale based on percentage damage increases. Also I very dislike the idea of adding a minion addition to DS as it makes very little strategic sense. A key part of the minions skills is the secondary activated ability which we would not have access to outside of DS. Not to mention the fact minion builds do not synergize well with power or condimancers because they do not scale with stats and require trait points to be effective. While not totally useless, do we really want a 5# skill that is based on a utility set that is underused in PvP, WvW, and PvE dungeons?

EDIT: unless they change the fact that lich kills all your minions, you shouldnt see it apart of any minion build

@Zinwrath… all DS skills benefit both the power builds and the condition builds. DS 1 – adds bleeds on crit even though you will never use it to do so becase… DS 2 – adds bleeding + chill, might be not very useful in PvE except when dodging something, but in PvP it’s extremely useful both power based (chill) or condition based (bleeds), DS 3 – CC for power builds, damage and CC for condition builds… DS 5 – the reason you don’t use DS 1 in condition builds, it’s an AoE that on crit sustains bleeding…

Ok now that we got that out of the way… a minion related skill on DS 5 would pretty much force you to run with a minion if you ever want to use that skill.

Secondly… does the skill i suggested not effect minions as well ?… does it not improve the minions as well ?… It amplifies damage… even minion damage, returns health or does more damage based on the opposite player’s decision… even for a minion build.

“chance are you would always use this ablity at the start of your rotation of skills for maximum damage, throwing this out would be a big flag saying “i’m about to do mean things to you” allowing them to ignore it entirely.”
Exactly… such a strong skill comes with a price, therefor you need to know when and how to use it… use it unwisely and it’s like nothing, use it at the right time and you take the upper hand… in any and ALL builds… and it helps not only PvP but also PvE and WvW.

Because it can be blocked it has to be slow so it can actually be effectively blocked… if it can’t be blocked we have too much against blockers already. If it is slow… it can be too easily dodged, just like dark path, spectral grasp and many others…
Since the ability “could” be a “game breaker” in some cases, it has to have a high CD, if it is dodgeable… people will learn to keep one dodge for it always… therefor making it useless…

That about covers it i think…
Feel free to continue.

Saw this on another forum topic apparently quoted from Anet "Awesome ideas guys. Just wanted you to know we’re watching/listening to your ideas for things that fit GW2.

Keep in mind that we are trying to find a condition that can be used by multiple classes (doesn’t have to be all classes, but we like to keep the condies/boons low in the game so that it’s easy for players to learn) and something that has cool play for the caster, as well as the target.

So, with that in mind, keep the ideas flowing!"

So are you going to change it and come up with a new idea then Nemesis?

DeathenShada.6397:

Saw this on another forum topic apparently quoted from Anet "Awesome ideas guys. Just wanted you to know we’re watching/listening to your ideas for things that fit GW2.

Keep in mind that we are trying to find a condition that can be used by multiple classes (doesn’t have to be all classes, but we like to keep the condies/boons low in the game so that it’s easy for players to learn) and something that has cool play for the caster, as well as the target.

So, with that in mind, keep the ideas flowing!"

So are you going to change it and come up with a new idea then Nemesis?

His idea is still good for that, cool play for the caster and the target. The condition will still benefit necros the most because of epidemic, unless they end up giving other classes access to AoE versions of it.

I seriously feel like we should get access to confusion as they are probably going to give mesmers our new condition.

DeathenShada.6397:

Saw this on another forum topic apparently quoted from Anet "Awesome ideas guys. Just wanted you to know we’re watching/listening to your ideas for things that fit GW2.

Keep in mind that we are trying to find a condition that can be used by multiple classes (doesn’t have to be all classes, but we like to keep the condies/boons low in the game so that it’s easy for players to learn) and something that has cool play for the caster, as well as the target.

So, with that in mind, keep the ideas flowing!"

So are you going to change it and come up with a new idea then Nemesis?

Not to question ArenaNet’s intentions… but…

They are adding a skill 5 on Death Shroud for the necromancers in order to make the class more balance i presume, certainly not to imbalance it even further.

The fact that this condition will be shared with other classes makes me… pause a bit. If you have a glass 1 that has more water in it then glass 2, you add water in glass 2 to make it even, then why would you add water in glass 1 again… Of course this is a blunt argument but let’s continue a bit…

So far we have…
Bleeding – Inflicts X damage per second. Stacks in intensity.
Blind – Causes the target’s next hit to miss instead. Stacks in duration.
Burning – Inflicts X damage per second. Stacks in duration.
Chilled – Reduces movement speed and skill recharge by 66%. Stacks in duration.
Confusion – Inflicts X damage each time a foe uses skill. Stacks in intensity.
Crippled – Reduces movement speed by 50%. Stacks in duration.
Fear – Causes the target to run directly away from the caster. Stacks in duration.
Immobilized – Immobilizes and prevents dodge. Stacks in duration.
Poison – Inflicts X damage per second. Reduces outgoing heals by 33%. Stacks in duration.
Vulnerability - Increases damage the target takes by 1%. Stacks in intensity.
Weakness - Causes 50% of attacks to be glancing and reduces endurance regeneration by 50%. Stacks in duration.

This conditions also have a an opposite in the game in the form of some boon… this conditions can also be achieved by corrupting their opposite boon. The entire game was designed around this boons / conditions variables, all the skills were adjusted for this… they have also tried to incorporate everything you might need into the game at launch.

We have blind, burn, chill… movement speed reduction (cripple), daze aka interrupt, stun… fear… In this setup there isn’t much “unique” stuff left that will not imbalance the game. You can’t increase or decrease condition damage because by default it goes through toughness… you can’t reduce the target’s armor to power damage because we already have vulnerability. Movement related conditions have been covered…

I do not understand their thought process behind this. I also believe that it will have too great of an impact on everything… which, even if positive, i believe it is too hard to calculate the balance of it, while starting at a foundation that is not yet perfectly balanced…

… and my 3rd and final argument: All the in game conditions present so far have multiple way of being applied by the player at any given time. We have more then 1 skill that applies that condition per build per class per player. A new dark theme condition that is only on DS 5… what is up with that ?… Or will they put this condition on other skills as well ? For all classes ?… So much balancing to do then…

If not… and it’s a unique condition on one unique skill, has to be "special"y strong. What are we going to get, agony ?

EDIT: With this being said… i will now drop out of the initiative of adding the DS 5 skill. I still believe my skill was genius for the necromancer, it was just not what they were looking for i believe.

I do not claim to be able to theory craft from the top of my head something that will have that much of an impact on the game. The number of variables that it has to verify and go through, the number of scenarios it has to validate for balance is just too great… and like i said, the game is not 100% balance at the moment, modifying it… i believe is a bad idea for now… but then again i may not be an expert…

This is why none of my suggestions from the past modified the core of the game in any way. It’s simply too hard to calculate all the possible implications of that…

this is completely irrelevant Nemesis but since you said you are keep a close eye on this thread… lol I wanted to take the opportunity to ask you a question, what do you use in your offensive and defensive infusion slots? (If you want I will delete this post)

Nemesis.8593:

DeathenShada.6397:

Saw this on another forum topic apparently quoted from Anet "Awesome ideas guys. Just wanted you to know we’re watching/listening to your ideas for things that fit GW2.

Keep in mind that we are trying to find a condition that can be used by multiple classes (doesn’t have to be all classes, but we like to keep the condies/boons low in the game so that it’s easy for players to learn) and something that has cool play for the caster, as well as the target.

So, with that in mind, keep the ideas flowing!"

So are you going to change it and come up with a new idea then Nemesis?

Not to question ArenaNet’s intentions… but…

They are adding a skill 5 on Death Shroud for the necromancers in order to make the class more balance i presume, certainly not to imbalance it even further.

The fact that this condition will be shared with other classes makes me… pause a bit. If you have a glass 1 that has more water in it then glass 2, you add water in glass 2 to make it even, then why would you add water in glass 1 again… Of course this is a blunt argument but let’s continue a bit…

So far we have…
Bleeding – Inflicts X damage per second. Stacks in intensity.
Blind – Causes the target’s next hit to miss instead. Stacks in duration.
Burning – Inflicts X damage per second. Stacks in duration.
Chilled – Reduces movement speed and skill recharge by 66%. Stacks in duration.
Confusion – Inflicts X damage each time a foe uses skill. Stacks in intensity.
Crippled – Reduces movement speed by 50%. Stacks in duration.
Fear – Causes the target to run directly away from the caster. Stacks in duration.
Immobilized – Immobilizes and prevents dodge. Stacks in duration.
Poison – Inflicts X damage per second. Reduces outgoing heals by 33%. Stacks in duration.
Vulnerability - Increases damage the target takes by 1%. Stacks in intensity.
Weakness - Causes 50% of attacks to be glancing and reduces endurance regeneration by 50%. Stacks in duration.

This conditions also have a an opposite in the game in the form of some boon… this conditions can also be achieved by corrupting their opposite boon. The entire game was designed around this boons / conditions variables, all the skills were adjusted for this… they have also tried to incorporate everything you might need into the game at launch.

We have blind, burn, chill… movement speed reduction (cripple), daze aka interrupt, stun… fear… In this setup there isn’t much “unique” stuff left that will not imbalance the game. You can’t increase or decrease condition damage because by default it goes through toughness… you can’t reduce the target’s armor to power damage because we already have vulnerability. Movement related conditions have been covered…

I do not understand their thought process behind this. I also believe that it will have too great of an impact on everything… which, even if positive, i believe it is too hard to calculate the balance of it, while starting at a foundation that is not yet perfectly balanced…

… and my 3rd and final argument: All the in game conditions present so far have multiple way of being applied by the player at any given time. We have more then 1 skill that applies that condition per build per class per player. A new dark theme condition that is only on DS 5… what is up with that ?… Or will they put this condition on other skills as well ? For all classes ?… So much balancing to do then…

If not… and it’s a unique condition on one unique skill, has to be "special"y strong. What are we going to get, agony ?

EDIT: With this being said… i will now drop out of the initiative of adding the DS 5 skill. I still believe my skill was genius for the necromancer, it was just not what they were looking for i believe.

I do not claim to be able to theory craft from the top of my head something that will have that much of an impact on the game. The number of variables that it has to verify and go through, the number of scenarios it has to validate for balance is just too great… and like i said, the game is not 100% balance at the moment, modifying it… i believe is a bad idea for now… but then again i may not be an expert…

This is why none of my suggestions from the past modified the core of the game in any way. It’s simply too hard to calculate all the possible implications of that…

No that’s what I’m saying your idea is genius and easy to implement. I still love it and wish it would get implemented so I don’t want you to drop the idea; that wasn’t my plan when I posted that. I was just hoping that you would somehow modify it a little to make it all-class? if you get what I mean because it would be awesome to see it in game.

I didn’t watch all of the video…to much pre-point ambling…get to the point.
Could you please write what you are suggesting…because I could read it faster than I could learn what it is in the video. Only sincerity here…no trolling.

Also, VOTE!

Thus far the community is leaning towards a unique skill for DS #5.

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/9QKHP8X

Thanks for the survey link, I voted doubt it will change anets mind though…

Vandole.4150:

I think, they are adding both the skill and condition, regardless.

The point is that we don’t need ANOTHER condition.

DeathenShada.6397:

Thanks for the survey link, I voted doubt it will change anets mind though…

Well, assuming that they are really paying attention to our (the players) ideas…they should look hard and long at what they are really doing before just adding some new condition…there are other, better things, that can be done with the #5 spot on the necro… The necro doesn’t need any more conditions IMO…the current conditions it has need some tweeking… ::cough:: Fear :: cough::

Another condition means all current non-full cleanses are basically “devalued”; there are going to be slightly more conditions on targets, and so cleanses are slightly weaker.

Kitedyou.1720:

Vandole.4150:

I think, they are adding both the skill and condition, regardless.

The point is that we don’t need ANOTHER condition.

you might not think that way if a different class gets a new condition and we dont.

@ Bull,

If they add another condition it is going to throw the current, mostly functional, combat system into the toilette.

- Edit -

Besides, I don’t spec Condomancer anyways, so it wouldn’t matter much to me.

Be heard! There are a lot of people that already took the poll, don’t be left out! It’s a few clicks and a few seconds of your time!

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/9QKHP8X

Kited.
it may be something you can use as a power spec. weakness or blind arnt effected by condition dmg.

and I do actually agree with you that adding a new condition at this stage could be a bad move. but as they are going to do it anyway we should embrace it and influence their decision in a good way and not complain too much about something that may be a vefy nice addition to the game.

TIME WILL TELL.

My fear is they will spin the roulette wheel and pick whatever shotty suggestion for a condition the ball lands on, implement it, and the Necro will not be any the better after the patch.

The other issue is that DS is unique to our profession…why should any other class have access to the new condition?

What other classes are they thinking will get the condition?

How will the other class execute said condition?

Will it just be added on to some quick refresh skill and completely over shadow ours?

The necro’s ability to use it will likely be tied to a long refresh…I mean, look at all of the other skills (weapon), they are all listed from 1 – 3 (or 5 depending on weapon) based on their re-use timer…

So chances are DS #5 is going to be a long re-use time because DS #4 is 40 seconds….

Totally agree with Nemesis, i think he got it right on this matter.
There are already enough conditions in the game, with all the condition spectrum covered, there is no need to overwhelm new players with more conditions when the actual situation is already balanced with a condition and its counterpart boon.

Since it is a skill related to DS, it HAS to be something deeply related with Necro essence, not another random condition that more classes will be able to get.
Plus… many ppl time ago were QQing about DS skills being a little dull, this idea would bring a definitely interesting situation in game, it puts a choise in front of the opponent, where he has to understand “should i dispel this and let him heal, so the fight will get longer; or can i stand the following dmg ?”

totally supporting this.

p.s.
the only thing i would change are damage . Cuase considering an average scenario in spvp, the target would have 10-12 stacks of bleeding, with a 1200 condition damage, it gets 1236 dmg per second, and lets add another 200 dmg per second from poison, and lets add the little direct damage of a pure condition build to round up for a total 1600 damage per second.
if the target cleanse conditions (including soul eater) after the first second of daze, the total dmg he got from the skill is 2 so 32 in this case, and the necro would get healed for … 96, quite little rewarding for a combo with a 30s cd skill.

lets suppose we also fear the target right after, to get the second tick off, (assuming we also have terror trait), the total dps at that time would be around 2500, so a 4% of that would be 100, for a total of 196 dmg done by soul eater. If it gets dispelled at this time it would heal for 588, not really a big deal.

The idea its good, i’ll just tune up dmg a bit to make it effective.
like 8%, 12%, 16%, 20%
considering a dps scenario like this:
1600 dps, 2500 dps, 1400 dps, 1200 dps
soul eater would deal…
128 + 300 + 224 + 240 = 892
if it doesnt get dispelled, the final dmg will be 1784
if it gets dispelled at 3rd second, will heal for 1956

Or make Soul Eater damage a life siphon, affected by Bloodthirst trait. In my opinion, typical heal without Bloodthirst trait from one target should be 2,5k. This would give that trait a new life. Soul Eater heal could also affect your minions, healing them for same amount

Beautiful. Absolutely, breathtakingly beautiful. I though up something somewhat similar when I say the SotG interview, but your Soul Eater is an absolutely boon to necromancers everywhere.

The only issue I have is that Anet said that they were testing it out on the necro, and that they planned to move it to other professions. I mean, I don’t truly understand the reasoning for them to want to create a new condition, but if they are attempting to help out the necro, this is a near-perfect solution. (The perfect solution, is of course, summoning a row of 23 Flesh Golems and having them all perform a 10-second slow speed charge)

I’ve got it !… Ohhhh… i’m so all over this one… New addition to the initial video coming soon.

Nemesis.8593:

I’ve got it !… Ohhhh… i’m so all over this one… New addition to the initial video coming soon.

Alright way to go Nemesis! I’m looking forward to it!

“Little suggestion” for the madness thing (if a new condi has to be implemented), change it from mind control/ui screwup (everyone hates those) to just allow friendly fire pve (just able to hit allies not themself) and for pve force mobs allies and themself with their skills too.

You can get Necro, Warrior (stabby stabby got mobility and control already), Mesmer and Ranger as you said.

Its pressure, it forces lower use of aoe (that kinda dominate because they do about the same damage as single target skills), punishes no coordination and works ok in pve.

So, to clarify, the skill you suggest (Soul Eater) would be a debuff that lasts four seconds that amplifies dmg done by the necromancer, and this skill would apply Madness on hit? Or was Soul Eater your first suggested condition and you are scrapping it entirely in favor of Madness?

Georc.2958:

So, to clarify, the skill you suggest (Soul Eater) would be a debuff that lasts four seconds that amplifies dmg done by the necromancer, and this skill would apply Madness on hit? Or was Soul Eater your first suggested condition and you are scrapping it entirely in favor of Madness?

Soul Eater is the skill… madness is the condition that goes into certain skills, just like with most other conditions in the game at the moment. One skill does a condition + something else in it. Sometimes the same skill do multiple conditions…

Soul Eater would be the Death Shroud 5 skill, and madness is the condition that it is included into it… and can be shared with other classes. Since it is attached to a skill… you don’t have to worry about the fact that if you add it to more then one class they cancel each other out… because you simply attach it to stronger or less strong skills… therefor it’s not just the condition that modifies the balance, therefor you can keep the balance in check via the skill it is attached to.

Someone argued that it will be frustrating… people find stun lock frustrating, stealthers frustrating… people that do chain knockdown… my chain fear build. Anything could be seen as frustrating, but in this case you can make it funny and visually pleasing so that the person behind the screen can sometimes smile about it…

This is the most i am comfortable to change the game with, you guys know that i am sort of against modifying the game too much. This wouldn’t modify the core of the game since it doesn’t upset the balance between conditions… since your character doesn’t actually get effected, it is you… that gets effected.

In case people were looking for part 2… i was too tired last night to make this post.
Here it is…
Guild Wars 2 – Necromancer’s Death Shroud skill 5 [suggestion] – part II: Madness

I havn’t commented on any of the ds5 threads yet because (you said it yourself) it’s really hard to think of a new condition when the ones that are allready there cover every possible dot or cc. And most people just came up with another damge type of condition (like agony… now available for players) which is just boring and/or unnecessary.

So, I totally agree that the new condition (should there really be one) would have to be a non-damaging one.
Tbh I thought about your idea myself, and I’m sure lots of others have before as well. But: I’m not sure it is as simple to implement as you make it sound.
Because:
You call your condition madness, but what it does are very different things in pve and pvp. So really you proposed two different conditions.

1. The mindcontrol of npcs:
This idea is good. It would work similar to a reflect skill of guardians or mesmers, but the damage gets “reflected” to other npcs.

2. The hallucination:
This I have a problem with. Because it comes down to the extent of the graphic distortion. Black screen: definitely overpowered. Just some weird wiggling or blur… maybe too weak to make a difference. Also, I’m sure that people who play competitively would just reduce their graphics to “best performance” and gone are all fancy misperception effects.
Also: there are a lot of skills on every class that work untargeted. If you just stick with them you’ll be fine. Like: necros go into death shroud and start life leeching. So during that time this misperception-condition would be useless.

So… what I would do is: take the pve madness and apply it to pvp as well. You said this wouldn’t work, but it does:
If you have this condition on you, then the next attack gets misdirected at an ally. done.

However, even then I’m not sure if it is that easy to implement.
Also, the whole thing (especially with the graphic glitching) sounds more like a new mesmer skill to me…

Yeh i felt the same, it really sounds more like mesmers stuff, thats the class that mainly tricks enemies mind. I think it would be better not to add any new condition and keep the original Soul eater skill on DS5 and thats it.
Actually “madness” looks like the only possible condition to introduce at this state of the game, without further imbalancing classes, but personally i would just stick with the skill.

I played a game years ago where there was this “mind distortion” and was causing the target screen to blurr, but it wasnt used so much, maybe cause that was quite a nobrain game, so just spamming some skills could actually shot someone dead, maybe in gw2 a blurr could actually cause more troubles.
But again, i dont really feel the need of another condition, mainly cause the boon/cond system is already balanced with each counterparts, adding one more should mean also adding a boon counterpart which i cont think can get its place here.

conclusion:
dear Anet, just get Soul Eater in, with some balanced %dmg.

Agreed after watching the video it seemed very mesmer ish but the idea itself sounded great. If anet is bent on adding a new condition add this one, if not just stick with the original soul eater idea. It will be much more beneficial for necromancers.

I just realized that GW2 already has a perception changing skill. Check this out (sort of like getting drunk in WoW)

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Stein_of_Cold_Beer

It would be a really easy task for them to add that already perception changing thingie to the skill if they wanted.

Edit: Picture isn’t as clear as I would like. It makes the screen all distorted and wavy.

Editx2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QagrUd8INvU

^ those effects check at 4:45