Guild Wars 2

In general, if one takes Soul Reaping one also takes Vital Persistence and either Death Perception or Dhuumfire. This gets rather stale, so why not make a couple adjustments:

First, Shroud’s passive drain, as someone else suggested, could be reduced to 3% (from 4%) and Vital Persistence could be adjusted accordingly.

Second, merge Fear of Death with Terror and either forge a new trait or move Foot in the Grave here (I prefer the latter). If Foot in the Grave is moved, this is the more general (sort of), less shroud based trait I propose in its stead:

Death’s Knock: Spectral Grasp deals damage and pierces and chills up to five foes before it reaches your target. Spectral Grasp recharges lifeforce generating weapon skills for each enemy struck. Weapon skills that generate lifeforce attack faster and deal additional damage.
-Damage: x
-Chilled (4s)
-Lifeforce: 15% (the maximum regardless of the number of affected targets)
-Number of Targets: 5
-Pierces
-Range: 1200
-Damage Increase: 7%
-Attack Speed Increase: 10%
-Recharge Reduced: 1s

Third, Unyielding Blast could not only cause shroud skill 1 to inflict vulnerability but also cause the skill to strike one additional target (or something like that).

Finally, it would be nice if Gluttony also caused your healing skill to grant about 5% lifeforce on activation or simply raised the lifeforce gain increase from 10% to around 12%.

Of course this is largely superfluous since there are more pressing, “needed” changes elsewhere. Anyways, thoughts?

>trait line about empowering shroud
>give us a grandmaster trait that doesn’t empower shroud

lol

Reknarok.7582:

>trait line about empowering shroud
>give us a grandmaster trait that doesn’t empower shroud

lol

To be fair, the trait line’s secondary focus is generating lifeforece i.e. Soul Marks and Spectral Mastery. So it wouldn’t completely be (but definitely some) out of place to have a grandmaster trait that indirectly or directly affects lifeforce generation rather than shroud alterations. Regardless, would it actually be a bad thing to slightly shift/reduce the “shroud only” focus of Soul Reaping? “Empowering shroud” can be done multiple ways afterall; not just futzing with on enter/exit of shroud or “x happens” while in shroud (though these definitely have some merit).

The problem I have with the Shroud grandmaster traits are that Death perception is kind of useless now we have Decimate Defenses. And Dhuumfire seems to be the go to trait for power reaper builds just because it is the least useless trait to take. I would love to see Dhuumfire and Unyielding Blast merged and then add a new trait. Something that adds quickness on crit maybe? I’m not too sure but the suggested idea above seems way too overpowered.

Lahmia.2193:

I’m not too sure but the suggested idea above seems way too overpowered.

Sometimes I’m a bit dense, how specifically could it be “way too overpowered”? Though my suggestion certainly can be quite strong (and now looking back, even too strong, my apologies), I attempted to reign it in by means of access. Personally, I feel that if a trait/modifier affects one skill (like Transfusion) or specific ones (similar to Signets of Suffering and Lingering Curse), it should be relatively stronger compared to a more general modifier (like Close to Death). I also have a tendency toward “interesting ideas” rather than tediously balanced ones (regarding numbers and potential); so my suggestion(s) should probably be taken with a grain of salt.

I like the idea but it effects way too many things to be called balanced. “Weapon skills that generate life force are faster and deal more damage” includes greatsword, staff and dagger auto attack, axe #2, gs #3 & #5, sceptre #3, focus #4, warhorn #5. That alone would seem a bit too powerful but then you have the addition of the spectral grasp aspect. That bit seems far more balanced but the only problem is it seems to be very similar to Grasping Darkness (GS #5).

The increased attack speed and damage is a bit much actually, though it’s not as though you can have all the weapons/skills equipped at the same time. As for the Spectral Grasp aspect, it is similar to Grasping Darkness, but I envisioned it still pulling 1 target (not 5 like Grasping Darkness); the additional (5) targets just take damage and reduce the recharge of lifeforce generating weapon skills by 1s each. Also, having two “Grasping Darkness-like” skills would be somewhat amusing to use, but that’s beside the point.

What if Death’s Knock would instead just lower the cooldown of lifeforce generating abilities by X% instead of attack speed/damage? That wouldn’t be unprecedented, and still fit the theme of Soul Reaping being about lifeforce generation and Shroud uptime. (Mesmers get an identical trait in Illusions that lowers the recharge of all abilities that generate illusions, and it affects 1-2 abilities on absolutely every weapon)

The only SR traits I do not use are Fear of Death and Unyielding Blast. Both have low value compared to the other two choices.

Anchoku.8142:

The only SR traits I do not use are Fear of Death and Unyielding Blast. Both have low value compared to the other two choices.

That’s why Dhuumfire would be perfect for joining with Unyielding Aura.

Mateo.1045:

What if Death’s Knock would instead just lower the cooldown of lifeforce generating abilities by X% instead of attack speed/damage? That wouldn’t be unprecedented, and still fit the theme of Soul Reaping being about lifeforce generation and Shroud uptime. (Mesmers get an identical trait in Illusions that lowers the recharge of all abilities that generate illusions, and it affects 1-2 abilities on absolutely every weapon)

That’s a fair point, but since several lifeforce generating weapon skills are auto-attacks it would reduce the trait’s appeal. Unless you were referring to all abilities (beyond my suggestion for just weapon ones) that generate lifeforce it could work; of course the “X%” would have to be a maximum of 10-12% to avoid significant cooldown reductions by taking both “Death’s Knock” and Spectral Mastery or Soul Eater (a real shame it hasn’t been buffed yet) for example. Though even 10% (resulting in 30% when combined) would be arguably too much for how many abilities could be affected by it.

I would rather point out the fact that for any build remotely needing shroud you have to take soul reapin, because LF gen is kitten without it, I feel like numbers and traits could be tweaked to change this. People complain about having to take elite trait lines, but soul reaping is almost a must with reaper. Many other classes are like this as well with trait lines.

I would like to see Fear of Death integrated into Terror.

With FoD’s SR slot open, a trait that automatically strips a couple stacks of a target’s might or nibbles at Defiance every few seconds may be simple but useful.

Unyielding Blast could add more vulnerability and increase projectile speed 33 per cent.