Guild Wars 2

So from the dev livestream just now, it seems there will be a new stat grouping of Dire:

Dire Stat Combo (Condition Damage, Toughness, Vitality)

Sounds pretty tempting for Necro no?

They already have this in ascended gear (although the ascended has some precision, too) and it is amazing for wvw. If this becomes a whole set I’ll be ecstatic. And tanky.

What!!! With out a doubt!!! Im all over that like white on rice!

Also rune of scavenging wiil become condition damage and life steal!

I will switch in a heartbeat.

oZii.2864:

What!!! With out a doubt!!! Im all over that like white on rice!

Also rune of scavenging wiil become condition damage and life steal!

And travellers will have move speed bonus too!

Some nice mixed combos to help out a few things we are lacking

Did they say which would be the primary stat? Condition damage?

Now if only we get some fixes to Death and Blood Magic we may finally be able to build a true “attrition” conditionmancer.

Sebastian Knight.4736:

Did they say which would be the primary stat? Condition damage?

Now if only we get some fixes to Death and Blood Magic we may finally be able to build a true “attrition” conditionmancer.

Condition damage is the main stat on dire

Traveler’s drops will be replaced with the Dire Stat Combo (Condition Damage, Toughness, Vitality)

Could I get a link to this, please? I am very curious what else was said.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Could I get a link to this, please? I am very curious what else was said.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/economy-report-brace-yourself-disequilibrium-is-coming/

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Could I get a link to this, please? I am very curious what else was said.

This is the economy blogpost – new stat combos came about from the removal of magic find.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/economy-report-brace-yourself-disequilibrium-is-coming/

Here is a VoD of the live stream

http://www.twitch.tv/guildwars2/c/2844578

Since I already run a build based off carrion instead of rabid gear as well as these ascended pieces in wvw, I figured I’d state the nearly obvious and point out that a build without doesn’t lend itself well to dhuumfire.

With dire stat comination we will lose the bleed on crit but we will gain MASS GAIN IN VIT/TOUGHNESS if youre tryin to play tank,

so now a 0/10/30/30/0 doesnt look bad obviusly for a minion tank

Roe.3679:

Since I already run a build based off carrion instead of rabid gear as well as these ascended pieces in wvw, I figured I’d state the nearly obvious and point out that a build without doesn’t lend itself well to dhuumfire.

You just need a crit and its guaranteed proc as long as you don’t have a super low crit chance I don’t see it being much of a issue.

And here I was hoping for an actually useful stat combo like power precision condi damage or condi damage power precision (better versions of rampager).

spoj.9672:

And here I was hoping for an actually useful stat combo like power precision condi damage or condi damage power precision (better versions of rampager).

Celestial!

Meh… Condition builds need precision for the on crit sigils and on crit traits. But it seems nice

oZii.2864:

Roe.3679:

Since I already run a build based off carrion instead of rabid gear as well as these ascended pieces in wvw, I figured I’d state the nearly obvious and point out that a build without doesn’t lend itself well to dhuumfire.

You just need a crit and its guaranteed proc as long as you don’t have a super low crit chance I don’t see it being much of a issue.

Sure, but you will lose some uptime if you switch from full rabid to full dire, unless all of the dire pieces have some precision on it like the ascended pieces, which should keep the crit chance somewhat respectable. But if it has no precision, it will devalue the 30 trait points you spend on getting dhuumfire, and the question then becomes whether or not the burning proc, coming less often, is worth giving up things like greater marks, reduced staff cooldowns and stability on DS, for instance.

I doubt this changes much for spvp or pve, but wvw Necros will probably have a choice to make regarding whether they want dhuumfire or more utility/defense, instead.

Yeah, I absolutely see myself taking these and the ascended with a little precisions, dropping earth sigil for geo, dropping 30 points in spite for some other combination (banking on an improvement to blood), and run the scavenger runes for life steal and condi damage.

Of course it is all speculation right now, but it would be the first time I have deviated from Rabid in 10 months.

I wouldn’t hold my breathe for improvements to blood, at least not with this upcoming patch. Would be awesome if it happened, but I doubt it does.

Rennoko.5731:

Yeah, I absolutely see myself taking these and the ascended with a little precisions, dropping earth sigil for geo, dropping 30 points in spite for some other combination (banking on an improvement to blood), and run the scavenger runes for life steal and condi damage.

Of course it is all speculation right now, but it would be the first time I have deviated from Rabid in 10 months.

So your thinking to drop all 30 points from spite? Me and a guildie are talking about it in TS right now I could see dropping 10 from spite but losing an additional 20% condition duration I don’t know.

My 0/30/20/20/0 build will be even more tanky and even more condi dmg woot!!!

This might be awesome for WvW, but for the most part I’m tanky enough with a carrion + rampager mix. I’m not sure I’ll be alting anytime soon.

0/30/10/0/30 Seems like it’ll be interesting, Rely on Death Shroud for Crit Chance

0/20/20/0/30 also seems decent as well

oZii.2864:

Rennoko.5731:

Yeah, I absolutely see myself taking these and the ascended with a little precisions, dropping earth sigil for geo, dropping 30 points in spite for some other combination (banking on an improvement to blood), and run the scavenger runes for life steal and condi damage.

Of course it is all speculation right now, but it would be the first time I have deviated from Rabid in 10 months.

So your thinking to drop all 30 points from spite? Me and a guildie are talking about it in TS right now I could see dropping 10 from spite but losing an additional 20% condition duration I don’t know.

What is there in spite to justify those 20 points? As a conditionmancer spite is pretty much dhuumfire or bust.

Godless.1857:

So from the dev livestream just now, it seems there will be a new stat grouping of Dire:

Dire Stat Combo (Condition Damage, Toughness, Vitality)

Sounds pretty tempting for Necro no?

Coupled with the new scavenger runes it might make for an interesting new build

Roe.3679:

oZii.2864:

Rennoko.5731:

Yeah, I absolutely see myself taking these and the ascended with a little precisions, dropping earth sigil for geo, dropping 30 points in spite for some other combination (banking on an improvement to blood), and run the scavenger runes for life steal and condi damage.

Of course it is all speculation right now, but it would be the first time I have deviated from Rabid in 10 months.

So your thinking to drop all 30 points from spite? Me and a guildie are talking about it in TS right now I could see dropping 10 from spite but losing an additional 20% condition duration I don’t know.

What is there in spite to justify those 20 points? As a conditionmancer spite is pretty much dhuumfire or bust.

Hmm there are probably 2 traits I do like but I can see your point. Ill be trying 0/30/10/0/30 most of this weekend.

Roe.3679:

They already have this in ascended gear (although the ascended has some precision, too) and it is amazing for wvw. If this becomes a whole set I’ll be ecstatic. And tanky.

Definitely. Agree, and I believe this stat combo is the most efficient return a Condi Necro can get. It’s just a matter of how much do you want, as taking a full set would make you very indestructible, but there does come a point where your DPS gets so low have to wonder if its worth taking back some offense even if it isn’t strictly as good as the vit/tougness you give up. Especially since those two stats reinforce each other and only make each other better and better.

Fortunately, or unfortunately, depending how you prefer to play, you can still be very effective while being extremely tanky, simply due to how often opponent strategy in group fights boil down to ‘target the Necro’. And at least in WvW most players are too dumb to switch off of you even as they are doing weak damage and are being killed largely by your teammates. Not to mention, without proper condition clear, even having condi as your only offensive stat, you can still kill suprisingly fast.

I would still probably on the whole prefer the Necro got balanced a little more in the way of quick escape / total damage mitigation techniques so we could more freely build offensively with more clean conscience that we weren’t doing something sub-optimal.

The only discord with this combo is versus the Dhumfire condi build, as since you get all that power going down Spite, it really does lend itself for you to going Carrion and actually having access to powerful wells, hard hitting Life Blasts, and big Feast’s of Corruption when you want that, all while still having great condition damage. Too much Dire would really weaken those options.

You do realise that this stat combo is gonna lead to more crying from tards that necro is “op” and “unkillable” when used in wvw.

Personally I don’t think they should have added this stat combo, conditions are strong enough as it is. The fact that you had to choose between rabid, carrion or a mix from the two came with some form of drawback; gave you either less hp or less toughness.

One could argue that they also have a power version (ppt) but those builds don’t exactly are hard hitters so come with a draw back in less overall damage. With this cond dmg set you gain survivability and don’t suffer any loss in overall dmg.

Condition builds did not need buffing, at all.

Will Rabid still be gear of choice in PvE?

Gnat.9405:

Will Rabid still be gear of choice in PvE?

Doubtful, seeing as with this new set you gain extra survivability and don’t loose overall damage.

Glenn.3417:

You do realise that this stat combo is gonna lead to more crying from tards that necro is “op” and “unkillable” when used in wvw.

Personally I don’t think they should have added this stat combo, conditions are strong enough as it is. The fact that you had to choose between rabid, carrion or a mix from the two came with some form of drawback; gave you either less hp or less toughness.

One could argue that they also have a power version (ppt) but those builds don’t exactly are hard hitters so come with a draw back in less overall damage. With this cond dmg set you gain survivability and don’t suffer any loss in overall dmg.

Condition builds did not need buffing, at all.

I’m quite aware of this, but as far as I’m concerned the necro vision is to facetank damage and not avoid it, block it, etc. So might as well tank it to the best of my ability.

I do fear though that the necro is becoming more and more of a skill-less class. No need to master evades, just tank it. No need to time burst, just hit 1 for tons of conditions. But either way, I enjoy the attrition playstyle and I will be using this gear.

Glenn.3417:

Gnat.9405:

Will Rabid still be gear of choice in PvE?

Doubtful, seeing as with this new set you gain extra survivability and don’t loose overall damage.

Of course, this will change if they don’t have any prescision… no matter what your damage is, you need the crit factor for certain sigils, runes, and crests.

I’m actually not so certian I would switch to this gear on my necro. I get a lot of damage out of barbed precision procs (which is currently 1/3 of my attacks) and I don’t run condition duration, so swapping to this would make my bleed stacking significantly weaker. I noticed a change immedietly when I swapped from Sigil of Earth to Sigil of Blood in my stacking ability, and I’m sure that swapping here as well would make it even tougher.

The upside is that with tuning crystals, those bleeds I can stack would hit HARD.

Ashabhi.1365:

Glenn.3417:

Gnat.9405:

Will Rabid still be gear of choice in PvE?

Doubtful, seeing as with this new set you gain extra survivability and don’t loose overall damage.

Of course, this will change if they don’t have any prescision… no matter what your damage is, you need the crit factor for certain sigils, runes, and crests.

I take the crapload of extra vit on Dire stat combo over the odd bleed you get from the precision on Rabid.
Now you can take 2 bleeds on weapon swap sigils and a condition duration increase for example.
And don’t forget, the extra vit you get counts double; your Life Force bar increases with vit aswell!

Roe.3679:

I’m quite aware of this, but as far as I’m concerned the necro vision is to facetank damage and not avoid it, block it, etc. So might as well tank it to the best of my ability.

I do fear though that the necro is becoming more and more of a skill-less class. No need to master evades, just tank it. No need to time burst, just hit 1 for tons of conditions. But either way, I enjoy the attrition playstyle and I will be using this gear.

I just fear that this set and the crying that will come with it will result in more necro nerfs. We all know anet isn’t know for their bright light decisions.

I find Precision to be overrated for condition builds:

- Barbed Precision is laughable: roughly 33% to apply 1 bleed tick. Don’t even mention it.
- Dhuumfire just need a crit every 10 sec, and every 10 sec you can get Fury: with only 20 points in Curses, no extra precision, that’s already 34% crit rate.
- Earth sigil can be switched to Geomancy (3 bleeds of 7 sec base) or any other decent sigil.

I can see Dire becoming the new Rabid in terms of popularity.

Glenn.3417:

You do realise that this stat combo is gonna lead to more crying from tards that necro is “op” and “unkillable” when used in wvw.

Personally I don’t think they should have added this stat combo, conditions are strong enough as it is. The fact that you had to choose between rabid, carrion or a mix from the two came with some form of drawback; gave you either less hp or less toughness.

One could argue that they also have a power version (ppt) but those builds don’t exactly are hard hitters so come with a draw back in less overall damage. With this cond dmg set you gain survivability and don’t suffer any loss in overall dmg.

Condition builds did not need buffing, at all.

If you just think about it who would kill faster if you had a 30/20/0/0/20 build both with sigil of earth on their scepter and auto attacking.

They both have the same attack speed and would stack bleeds at the same time at the same rate with same duration.

The rabid necro would crit more often stacking more bleeds than the dire stat necro and would crit his direct damage more often than the dire stat necro. The rabid necro would be at 48% chance to crit while the dire stat necro would be at 19% chance to crit.

I would definitely say losing 29% critical chance is a dps loss wouldn’t you agree?

While the main point of going condi is for condi damage your direct damage is a factor just like it is for direct damage builds that have bleeds on attacks by default. There is just no way around the math even though it feels like it doesn’t matter much.

I am really interested to see what happens with rune of scavenging life steal effects could be pretty interesting.

I don’t see this being a bad thing with this stat combo people are already contemplating dropping dhuumfire and all their points in spite which means -30% condition duration. That extra condition duration is important when you come across a melandru/lemongrass/dogged march warrior.

Ara.4569:

I find Precision to be overrated for condition builds:

- Barbed Precision is laughable: roughly 33% to apply 1 bleed tick. Don’t even mention it.
- Dhuumfire just need a crit every 10 sec, and every 10 sec you can get Fury: with only 20 points in Curses, no extra precision, that’s already 34% crit rate.
- Earth sigil can be switched to Geomancy (3 bleeds of 7 sec base) or any other decent sigil.

I can see Dire becoming the new Rabid in terms of popularity.

Barbed precision has a base duration of 2 seconds now.

Thinking you need survivability stats in PvE is laughable.

spoj.9672:

Thinking you need survivability stats in PvE is laughable.

PvE, yes. WvW, not so much.

Glenn.3417:

You do realise that this stat combo is gonna lead to more crying from tards that necro is “op” and “unkillable” when used in wvw.

Personally I don’t think they should have added this stat combo, conditions are strong enough as it is. The fact that you had to choose between rabid, carrion or a mix from the two came with some form of drawback; gave you either less hp or less toughness.

One could argue that they also have a power version (ppt) but those builds don’t exactly are hard hitters so come with a draw back in less overall damage. With this cond dmg set you gain survivability and don’t suffer any loss in overall dmg.

Condition builds did not need buffing, at all.

Terrormancer is pretty op for a 1v1, but luckily 1v1 so it doesn’t make a huge impact on wvw as a whole.

Ive been doing some math to understand how good or not this new gear will be.

I dont have exact values, since obviously the gears isnt out yet so no calculator has them, so i am working with estimated values.

Here is a link to a vit build with carrion: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fQAQNArYGmQgeAAAAIG9AAAgghqA8A-j0BB4MCiUFAk0RMFqIasVTFRjVJjIqWdDTKAImGB-w

and here is a link to a toughness build with rabid: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fQAQNArYGmQgeAAAAIG9AAAgghqA8A-j0BBINCiUFAk0RMHqIasVTFRjVdDTHjIqWKAImGB-w

Both of them are using runes of the undead just to make the comparison easier. Since there is not carrion ascended trinket, i put the rabid + vitality on the carrion build.

In full rabid, we have around 26k EHP. Since the difference in vitality from both builds is around 600, this would mean an increase in 6K EHP in a full dire gear, giving us around 32k EHP. The change from total HP would go from ~18k to around 24k.

This would increase our total EHP in 23%, and an even better survivability against other conditions (since it bypasses armor). Our condition damage would also slightly increase when using oils, because of the % 4 increase from vitality, which adds around 25 extra condition dmg points (1 extra tick from bleed).

Our crit chance would decrease from ~5x% to ~%2x (because of rabid in ascended). This precision decrease wouldnt affect dhuumfire that much, because of its icd of 10s.

Considering a full ascended rabid trinkets nets you between 24%(with vit) ~ 36% (with no vit) crit chance, i decided to test how the difference beetwen 24% and 54% would be. So i went to heart of the mists with full condition duration (100% bleed plus 33% on scepter skills). By only using scepter’s auto attack, it was around 12 stacks on 24%, and 15 stacks on 54%. With 54% the number of stacks would change constantly from 12 to 18, while on 24% it would sit on 12 almost all the time. But when using scepter#2 and dagger#5 the difference was far less noticeable. On 24% it would be 20 stacks, and with 54% it would be 22~23.

When testing, burning was doing 466 dmg, while bleed did 70 per tick. That means burning would be 6,6 bleed stacks. Poison also did 139, which is around 2 bleed stacks. Considering 100% uptime on poison and 40% uptime on bleed, this would give us 4,6 extra equivalent bleed stacks. So in the worst case, we would have a decrease from 15 + 4,6 to 12 + 4,6, which is a loss of 15,3% dps.

So i believe its a very good trade off to lose 15,3% dps in favor of getting 23% EHP. If the loss in dps is a bit to great, you could just use the rabid trinkets without vit, which would make get your crit to 36%.

Since bleeds arent our only damaging condition, i think that this new build will make us use more conditions instead of realying solely on bleeds. With the new confusion runes this build gets even more powerful, since it doesnt relies on crit chance. If fear becomes and interrupt, than this will probably be the new standart condition necro.

@teonimesic.1403

Mmm yummy! Nice work

I still think that even post the patch Carrion will be the way to go for a true cond duration/hybridish dungeon necro and on the maxing condition damage rabid wvwvw, but dire will probably be the knights condi equivalent, never actually better than any of the builds but strong enough to compete with both in their strengths while allowing for mistakes/learning time… or plain for lazy people that dont wanna dodge.

Andele.1306:

I still think that even post the patch Carrion will be the way to go for a true cond duration/hybridish dungeon necro and on the maxing condition damage rabid wvwvw, but dire will probably be the knights condi equivalent, never actually better than any of the builds but strong enough to compete with both in their strengths while allowing for mistakes/learning time… or plain for lazy people that dont wanna dodge.

You’re dealing with necros. Two dodges is all we get.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Andele.1306:

I still think that even post the patch Carrion will be the way to go for a true cond duration/hybridish dungeon necro and on the maxing condition damage rabid wvwvw, but dire will probably be the knights condi equivalent, never actually better than any of the builds but strong enough to compete with both in their strengths while allowing for mistakes/learning time… or plain for lazy people that dont wanna dodge.

You’re dealing with necros. Two dodges is all we get.

Thats why i said it, i mean we already have to eat 80% of what people should usually dodge, devs could plain go and remove endurance/dodge from necros and we would only see a small increase in total necro deaths; as a matter of fact if they designed our traits (and their trees) as well as mesmer ones and returned beta shroud, id give them the dodge option of all my characters (note that my other chars are thief mesmer and ranger).

Andele.1306:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Andele.1306:

I still think that even post the patch Carrion will be the way to go for a true cond duration/hybridish dungeon necro and on the maxing condition damage rabid wvwvw, but dire will probably be the knights condi equivalent, never actually better than any of the builds but strong enough to compete with both in their strengths while allowing for mistakes/learning time… or plain for lazy people that dont wanna dodge.

You’re dealing with necros. Two dodges is all we get.

Thats why i said it, i mean we already have to eat 80% of what people should usually dodge, devs could plain go and remove endurance/dodge from necros and we would only see a small increase in total necro deaths; as a matter of fact if they designed our traits (and their trees) as well as mesmer ones and returned beta shroud, id give them the dodge option of all my characters (note that my other chars are thief mesmer and ranger).

Well, i believe there is a place for every stat combination. Rampager really shine on PvE when you dont really need defense and can go for more power to avoid getting all your damage overriden; Rabid is really awesome in PvP where you need to burst your enemies fast and are usually going 1v1 or 1v2 and have a low respawn time. But in WvW, i believe necros will need the extra defense.

There are 3 very common situations in solo roaming on WvW:
1: Perma Stealth thiefs with ridiculously high attack power. The extra health will help to not get instagib
2: 1v1 against bunker with high healing (eles, guardians and warriors). Its basically a fight to see who lasts longer, and having more health and more life force will help winning. Although if the enemy has a lot of cleansing we probably lose.
3: 1vX. I higher health will give you more time to run inside a keep or go to your team’s supply camp.

These also apply when on a havoc team in WvW, most people these days know to focus the Necro almost immediately. Dire will help to make that an inefficient use of the other team’s alpha strike.

Going to do some math on this one.

Take the 30/20/0/0/20 build we see lately. The base stats for this build are, assuming undead runes, master tuning crystal, koi cakes, and max sigil of corruption

Power: 1216
Crit Rate: 13% (23% scaled fury uptime with furious demise, peak conditions)
Crit damage: 20% (1.7)
Armor: 1886 (966 toughness)
HP: 18,376 (916 Vit)
Malice: 1523+ 48.3 + 57.96 +36.64 = 1596

I listed the buffs from undead runes and the master tuning crystal separate. Looking at the different stat allotments, we’ll get

Rabid:
Power: 1216
Crit Rate: 46% (56% with furious demise, scaled for uptime)
Crit damage: 20% (1.7)
Armor: 2584 (1664 toughness)
HP: 18,376 (916 Vit)
Malice: 1523 + 83.2 + 99.84 +36.64 = 1743

Effective Power: 1693
Effective HP: 25,856
Barbed Precision: 0.74 additional bleed ticks per hit, base duration
Bleed damage: 129 per tick

Carrion:
Power: 1914
Crit Rate: 13% (23% scaled fury uptime with furious demise)
Crit damage: 20% (1.7)
Armor: 1886 (966 toughness)
HP: 25,356 (1614 Vit)
Malice: 1523 + 48.3 + 57.96 + 64.56 = 1694

Effective Power: 2222
Effective HP: 26,040
Barbed Precision: 0.30 bleeds per hit
Bleed damage: 127 per tick

Dire:
Power: 1216
Crit Rate: 13% (23% scaled fury uptime with furious demise, peak conditions)
Crit damage: 20% (1.7)
Armor: 2584 (1664 toughness)
HP: 25,356 (1614 Vit)
Malice: 1523 + 83.2 + 99.84 +64.56 = 1771

Effective Power: 1412
Effective HP: 35,668
Barbed Precision: 0.30 bleeds per hit
Bleed damage: 131 per tick

Dire vs. Rabid:

Dire has about 37.9% higher effective HP, making it extremely tanky in comparison. Dire does 2 more damage per tick with bleeding, making the tick damage from dire only 1.6% greater than rabid. For this, it sacrifices 20% off from direct damage, and also loses out on Sigil of Earth + 0.34 bleed ticks (base duration) every attack. Those ticks from barbed precision more than compensate the tick loss, since the amount to 7% off of scepter auto attack, 1.6% off of grasping dead, 1.7% off of enfeebling blood, and additional bleed ticks added to every non-bleeding attack (such as life transfer, which equates to 3.06 bleeds in itself). Sigil of Earth has a cooldown, so it is a pain in the rear to calculate, but it is fairly safe to assume that the sigil will be firing off much more frequently, and thus contributing more, with rabid.

This means that rabid does more damage than dire. Of course, using furious demise in such a way is difficult, since one can’t always pop into DS every 10 seconds. Overall, I’d rank dire as superior to rabid for condition builds.

Dire vs. Carrion:

Dire has 37% more EHP than carrion. Carrion has 57% higher effective power. Dire has 3.1% more bleed damage than carrion, and carrion has no additional bleeding mechanics to account for this.

Overall… it is more difficult here. The biggest advantage to carrion is the extra direct damage it brings. Condition damage can be highly polarizing, after all, wherein if someone has enough cleanses you are fully neutralized. When rending curse hits, on average against base armor, for 148 more damage per attack on carrion, life blast hits for 425 more per attack, feast of corruption hits for 611 more, necrotic grasp for 308 more, putrid mark for 557 more, which is better becomes muddied. It becomes every muddy-er when you factor in that carrion can use tactics that dire can’t, like wells and non-condition weapons.

So jury is out on that one. I’ll probably be sticking with my carrion set (with bits of rampager mixed in), largely because I like the fact that, on my personal build, life blast hits harder than the scepter auto attack at 100% duration.