Guild Wars 2

Anet, why are you trying to kill necromancers? you finally give them something useful (vulnerability on chill) and then nerf their biggest chill generator into the ground with a ridiculous FIVE SECOND INTERNAL COOLDOWN. do you copy/paste everything and call it balance? jebus chrabst reverse this right now. the trait as it stands is useless, even in 1v1 situations.

congratulations, you’ve managed to nerf reaper before it even goes live.

I came onto the forums to rant about this but I guess I’ve been beaten to it. The problem is their new Vuln on chill trait, not chill on blind. If they added the cooldown to that trait instead, it would still grant necros the ability to stack chill nicely but limit their ability to stack vuln so high on their own.

It seems that whatever arenanet does to necromancers they start crying about nerf first it was the healing and then arenanet reduces vuln now its chill once they fix it, it will be dhummfire…stop demanding your class is unbeatable in pvp what else do you want

it’s not only about PvP … this trait was quite used for CC in WvW zerg with the well of darkness… which become useless in the same time ….

Slapinator.4196:

It seems that whatever arenanet does to necromancers they start crying about nerf first it was the healing and then arenanet reduces vuln now its chill once they fix it, it will be dhummfire…stop demanding your class is unbeatable in pvp what else do you want

They took a trait that was OK/average/decent, and made it useless to balance a spec that hasn’t been released. Of course necros are mad. Also, necros have been bottom tier in pvp pretty much since launch, and still don’t make it on to most teams. Just because you can’t kill them in a 1vs1 when they start the fight with life force, or can’t dodge the massively telegraphed skills doesn’t mean they are op.

Slapinator.4196:

It seems that whatever arenanet does to necromancers they start crying about nerf first it was the healing and then arenanet reduces vuln now its chill once they fix it, it will be dhummfire…stop demanding your class is unbeatable in pvp what else do you want

you’re joking right?
firstly, i dont use chilling darkness in spvp.
secondly, do not come here ranting about your problems killing necromancers. get good
Thirdly, dhuumfire is obviously a PvE only skill.
and lastly, if you have nothing constructive to add to this thread, go eat a kite.

Lahmia.2193:

I came onto the forums to rant about this but I guess I’ve been beaten to it. The problem is their new Vuln on chill trait, not chill on blind. If they added the cooldown to that trait instead, it would still grant necros the ability to stack chill nicely but limit their ability to stack vuln so high on their own.

Actually , you can now no longer get more then 15 stacks of vulnerability at a time on the indestructable golem with the Bitter chill trait.

The change to only being able to stack chill 5 times affected this trait as well.

cephalo.3974:

it’s not only about PvP … this trait was quite used for CC in WvW zerg with the well of darkness… which become useless in the same time ….

And if they’re balancing around ZvZ fights in WvW, and they started with this, I’ll put on a kitten suit and lock myself in a chest.

Never used chilling darkness, kinda wondering how it was before that Anet considered they HAD to put and ICD on it.

I’m sure they felt there was a reasonable justification to do this change, contrary to popular belief Anet doesn’t go out of their way to screw us over, they just really suck at balancing us. Its an issue of ineptitude, not malice.

Slapinator.4196:

It seems that whatever arenanet does to necromancers they start crying about nerf first it was the healing and then arenanet reduces vuln now its chill once they fix it, it will be dhummfire…stop demanding your class is unbeatable in pvp what else do you want

Whenever Anet gives us uncalled nerfs we will complain, we are bottom tier in every aspect of the game, except for condi and boon manipulation, which are very weak unless you are up against a condi build. And even then it is only strong because every other condi class has strong condis. There is an obvious problem right here which you somehow fail to see.

Bhawb.7408:

I’m sure they felt there was a reasonable justification to do this change, contrary to popular belief Anet doesn’t go out of their way to screw us over, they just really suck at balancing us. Its an issue of ineptitude, not maliceport.

Not sure I agree,sometimes I think they nerf anything on necro that hurts their favorite classes. Can’t have their esport ready 6 class meta ruined by a Necro now can we…

Although when traited, Well Of Darkness could stack more vulnerability than Well Of Suffering. I didn’t see this as a problem because Darkness doesn’t deal damage and we’re only talking about vulnerability. Mesmers can max stack vulnerability with one combo. I seriously doubt the ability to stack vulnerability as the reason for them nerfing Chilling Darkness. This was done because of Deathly Chill.

Bhawb.7408:

I’m sure they felt there was a reasonable justification to do this change, contrary to popular belief Anet doesn’t go out of their way to screw us over, they just really suck at balancing us. Its an issue of ineptitude, not malice.

Somehow I have a hard time beliving that, they have been inept with the necromancer for as long as I’ve been playing the game. Somehow they seem to kitten things up way to often. I’ve worked with balancing smaller things in smaller games and I must say that most of the time it is about doing some number crunching and reducing the holes in the design to weak spots, to enable counterplay. And in the case of the Necromancer, none of these things seems to have been done.

Bhawb.7408:

I’m sure they felt there was a reasonable justification to do this change, contrary to popular belief Anet doesn’t go out of their way to screw us over, they just really suck at balancing us. Its an issue of ineptitude, not malice.

If I was going to make a guess, they nerfed chilling darkness because of Nightfall, not Well of darkness. Nightfall with that trait seems really strong, in theory. But Well of Darkness is pretty weak as is and the change makes it useless. But with the changes to the way chill will works with it only able to be stacked 5 times while its up seems to kill a well of darkness + Nightfall combo anyway so it seems they’re over nerfing it. They really only needed to hit one and not both if the argument stands at all. At the moment it didn’t seem like they needed to touch either with the core profession.

But yeah, I agree with you in that.

Bhawb.7408:

I’m sure they felt there was a reasonable justification to do this change, contrary to popular belief Anet doesn’t go out of their way to screw us over, they just really suck at balancing us. Its an issue of ineptitude, not malice.

I’m sorry but the way they concentrate on this and not the massive problems engis ans mesmers cause makes it really hard to believe that. Even if it isn’t it is a case of "we don’t want to nerf our favourite classes so let’s seek for stuff to “balance” that isn’T needed yet only maybe when HoT launches but not sure…oh, chill and the Reaper. perfect, let’s do this change months before it may actually be needed without having tested if it would actually be too strong and make it kitten poor."

Shiki.7148:

Bhawb.7408:

I’m sure they felt there was a reasonable justification to do this change, contrary to popular belief Anet doesn’t go out of their way to screw us over, they just really suck at balancing us. Its an issue of ineptitude, not malice.

I’m sorry but the way they concentrate on this and not the massive problems engis ans mesmers cause makes it really hard to believe that. Even if it isn’t it is a case of "we don’t want to nerf our favourite classes so let’s seek for stuff to “balance” that isn’T needed yet only maybe when HoT launches but not sure…oh, chill and the Reaper. perfect, let’s do this change months before it may actually be needed without having tested if it would actually be too strong and make it kitten poor."

one of the issues is they don’t have anyone on the design team who really likes the necromancer even in the slightest.

Please remove the 5 sec ICD on chilling darkness OR increase the chill time to at least 3 seconds OR reduce the ICD to 4 seconds. This WAS one of the most useful necro traits, and now, Anet, your ham-fisted approach to balancing traits has made this trait useless.

So much crying about a 5 second ICD…wowza…..it needed it. No ICD on that trait was insane.

drgast.1469:

So much crying about a 5 second ICD…wowza…..it needed it. No ICD on that trait was insane.

It was situationaly good with no ICD.

drgast.1469:

So much crying about a 5 second ICD…wowza…..it needed it. No ICD on that trait was insane.

Trolling?

Any ICD means the trait is worthless in AoE.

5s ICD means that our Blinds, all on 25 seconds cool down or longer will only produce one chill against one player.

Chill isn’t even that good. It’s great against Elementalists, but worthless against thieves. (& Revenants). It’s mostly harmless against engineers (many kit skills available at all times) and warriors (low base cool downs).

The only way this makes sense is if the necromancer is about to get good, spammable blind access (like a 100% projectile finisher on staff 1 or something similar)

No, just no. I cannot get over this one. Chilling Darkness’ literal only use was Well of Darkness. I’m not even gonna count our other two sources of blind every 30 seconds.
Chilling Darkness made a weak skill pretty decent. Let’s be realistic here. Well of Darkness has a huge cooldown of 50 seconds (that is a lot for a utility skill, and even compared to other well skills). Yes it could stack massive amounts of vuln and chill, oh but guess what, at the cost of TWO traits in TWO separate traitlines. So for two years we’ve been totally okay with Engies spamming 1 on nades and capping vuln on their own, or warriors just hundred blading stuff to death while vulning with basically every crit and auto but god forbid necros get something strong. This was basically one of the few redeeming qualities of condi necros in PvE. In PvP it’s not even that hard to understand that you have to actually move from an AoE. If YOU dont dodge out of it it’s your fault.

Let’s look at some numbers.
Well of Darkness’ base functionality is AoE blind, on a 50 second CD. Compare that to any thief’s blind spam. No question here.
We add a trait from the curses line. Great now we have an AoE chill that you have to stand on to max it out. Another similar skill: Ele’s staff frozen ground. 40sec CD. Both of these cases are weapon skills that dont even take a utility slot.
We add yet another trait from the spite line. Great, now we have an AoE that blinds, chills and vulns at the cost of two traitlines. I think it’s well woth the investment. Oh and let’s not forget if you want to reduce the CD to 40 sec you have to take yet a third traitline in blood magic for a grandmaster.

Please anet, revert this trait immediately. As I stated before this trait’s main interaction was well of darkness, this skill is now worthless and no one will use it. It’s not only nerfing the AoE chill and vuln on pulse, it also means it will only affect ONE target. Not to even mention the ICD is as long as the whole well duration. Numerically speaking we’ve gone from potentially blind+chill+vuln*5*pulse(5) to simply 1 proc. That’s 25procs to 1 single proc. 2500% effectiveness reduced. That’s the biggest nerf this game has seen in its whole existance.
If you’re that worried about the Reaper, whose only blind is an AoE around you that also roots you while you cast it, then you should maybe take off your rose tinted glasses for once and look at the stuff other casses can do for much, much less.
Even if we consider the plague elite, aoe blind chill and vuln for 15 is, admittedly, strong. But for an elite? Which also has gotten a massive nerf last patch and damages YOU as you use it? I mean the whole point of corruptions applying condis to yourself was so you could transfer them back to begin with, but how on earth are you gonna do that while transformed?
Come on, the bias is strong in this one. I wont accept any of this balance talk while Rampage for warriors is still a thing. Just no.

For some reason I had forgotten that an ICD makes it so AoEs only apply the effect to a single person.

What an incredibly extra-awful trait this now is.