Guild Wars 2

Lahmia.2193:

Arche.7326:

Lahmia.2193:

Arche.7326:

I said this in an earlier thread, but I think the simplest fix to nightfall is have it tick the moment its placed on the ground, that would make it very quick and potentialy be devastating as you no longer would be able to walk out of it.

It does tick as soon as you place it, then every 2 seconds afterwards (so 4 pulses over 6 seconds). Or do you mean for it to pulse every 1 second instead?

Yes, you are entirely right. Not sure what I was thinking when I wrote it. Ticking every second would be a big improvement which would lead to area being denied faster and more effectively. I do think letting it last for more than 6 seconds at that rate would be too much, so slightly reduced total duration but more effect.

Personally I’d change it so it has a fixed 240 radius, it follows you around as a mobile combo field and pulses each second but with a reduced duration, so it does the same amount of pulses as it does now.

If i remember correctly, that was suggested in the HoT beta as well and now that you say it I remember thinking it was a good idea, definitly better than increasing the pulse intervals like I was getting at.

Lahmia.2193:

Arche.7326:

I said this in an earlier thread, but I think the simplest fix to nightfall is have it tick the moment its placed on the ground, that would make it very quick and potentialy be devastating as you no longer would be able to walk out of it.

It does tick as soon as you place it, then every 2 seconds afterwards (so 4 pulses over 6 seconds). Or do you mean for it to pulse every 1 second instead?

Yes, you are entirely right. Not sure what I was thinking when I wrote it. Ticking every second would be a big improvement which would lead to area being denied faster and more effectively. I do think letting it last for more than 6 seconds at that rate would be too much, so slightly reduced total duration but more effect.

I said this in an earlier thread, but I think the simplest fix to nightfall is have it tick the moment its placed on the ground, that would make it very quick and potentialy be devastating as you no longer would be able to walk out of it. The GS5 should similarly start at max range and just pull in (i.e. no more shadow snakes that people walk away from). Those two changes would make a world of difference in making them harder to evade. It should be noted that its two very powerfull buffs to making the kit faster, 4 boons converted in an aoe with cripple and blind for .5 second cast time is very good, similarly would the pull be strong as it would occur twice as fast without compromising the slow idea of the job.

Both gravedigger and the AA chain needs significant damage buffs in terms of damage, in the range of 30-50% (for PvE viability), and the entirety of the shroud kit needs almost double damage to be worth using over GS spam. The traits should push it so that as long as shroud is above 50%, camping shroud should beat GS AA spam with gravedigger weaving and as soon as its pure gravedigger spam, jumping into shroud for shroud (3)2-5-4-2 and not AAing in shroud should still be an increase. This would require changes to “Strength of Undeath” to be strong enough and only work in shroud, but I think that Necro really needs to have its traits revisited, because they’re a real mess to behold.

This would create more interesting rotations for power and be really good for the job over all, i believe. Not contributing anything but a big HP pool and a kittenton of damage. This suggested balance is of course under the assumption that power reapers boon hate from other sources than the GS is recduced significantly.

On a more unserious note I also think that Shroud 5, regardless of balance, should act like Daredevils Finishing Blow, because its called Executioner’s Scythe and I love me some flavour.

Every time I see people suggesting buffs and fixes for reaper its always reducing cast times. I will disagree with that this will be a good way to solve the problems for two major reasons.

First off, it will cause homogenization of professions, which means that despite having different abilities the resulting playstyle will be similar and that there often will be abilities on jobs filling the exact same function albeit with different flavour. The end result is that things will seem and feel similar and end up bland.

Second: It goes against the design vision of the Reaper as a slow moving movie horror, while Anet arguably failed at actually making it perform like one. Mostly due to extremely underwhelming numbers in practice and a host of traits which underperform. I think it would be a shame to just abandon that vision in favour of homogenization when the simplest fix is a relatively simple potency adjustment on the skills.

Solving the more complex issues of the professions balance is very closely related to the extremely strong boon hate and solid condition management the necro has. Giving the Reaper the damage and survivability it numerically should have with how it is designed is actually not healthy for the PvP oriented game modes due to that. While it would certainly be interesting to have a job that kills people in an AA chain while simultaneously being able to shred boons is not a good thing. The unwillingness to split PvP and PvE balance is one reason for Necromancers always ending up on the weak side of the average line for PvE.

In order to properly create a balanced situation where the necromancer can be viable where it goes will require that the boon hate should be put in places of the trees which directly confilcts with the Power builds best damage dealing and survivability traits. Then the weapon effects and numbers needs to be adjusted to fit into that idea. I think Scourge providing the a condi damage centric elite spec will be very important to freeing up space for the reaper so it can fullfill the power dps/bruiser archetype as it would be possible to effectively control certain aspects, namely survivability and damage, when you can put them in two different mutualy exclusive specs.

Just gonna spitball some suggestions here since I feel like it.

First off damage just needs to be upped with around 20-30% on base on just about everything power related, and probably double those percentages for the shroud skills.

On top of that we need more traits that increase damage and creates incentive to balance shroud useage. The ideal would be to buff the kitten out of Strength of Undeath and make it more impactful than 5% and possibly also affect shroud skills at double the value. The idea would be to set a balance between the shroud skillset and the weapon skills where you want to stay in shroud with AAs above 50% shroud and use weaponskills while regaining it to 100%, striking the balance so that gravedigger overtakes shroud AAs for damage output when the target is below 50% and then only jumping into shroud for 2-5.

Switch Blighters Boon (preferably rework it so it wouldnt conflict with Soul Eating, maybe grant boons when you inflict vulnerability?) with Soul Eating and make the latter just have a % lifesteal on damage and give LF based on the % healed.

Deathly Chill should just be increased damage to chilled targets, probably like 15% or so in addition to the other buffs mentioned here, maybe give chill on crit as well.

Reaper’s Onslaught confilcts with swiftness, make it just give a brief period of invlunerability on a medium long CD when entering shroud. Still fits into the unstoppable movie horror theme of the bottom traits and solving some of necro’s issues with burst protection in pvp.

Relentless pursuit should probably be 50%/100% for reduced condi duration.

Then for things that would make for quite powerful buffs, make GS4 tick immediately once the circle is placed, have GS5 start its pull at maximum range to prevent targets from literally walking out of the aoe.

If you ever used the GS in a large teamfight when people are clumped and possibly disorganised, it can be a beast. Problem is, these fights do not happen all the time, and in those cases the dagger is safer damage.

In addition to that AA damage is a bit too low and Gravedigger aftercast seems to bug the reset sometimes. A reduction on that might be necessary.

Blaine Tog.8304:

Oh I’m not saying you can’t write a haiku in 5-7-5, I just feel the semi-irrational urge every time I see 5-7-5 to mention that that isn’t necessary because so many people still think it is.

It seems like I overreacted a bit, it happens quite a bit.

Not haiku, but some other random poetry I came up with, take it as an offering of peace.

Like leafs in autumn winds
We whirl with friends
Evermore
Now without
We do so
Nevermore

Blaine Tog.8304:

Arggg, English major pet peeve: Haiku’s don’t have to follow a 5-7-5 structure in English, and not even in Japanese (unless you’re really making an effort to be traditional). Most traditional Japanese haiku’s cannot even be translated into English kitten -7-5. What’s important is that the poem is short, contains a juxtaposition of two ideas, and usually features a seasonal reference. This poem isn’t about nature, but at least it has a decent juxtaposition so I’ll let that slide. Just be aware that the 5-7-5 structure is a lie perpetuated by 3rd grade teachers who think this is an easy way to get kids to write some basic poetry, but no one ever bothers to correct their oversimplification. /rant

I’m fully aware that on isn’t really the same thing as syllable, but it makes it easier to write if you use that structure. But considering that there are both free and fixed form haiku the 5-7-5 “rule” isn’t much of a rule and that in modern times it is increasingly common to see haikus that aren’t related to scenery and seasons as well as the fact that I’m not fluent in Japanese and wrote it 4:40 in the morning and spent 5 minutes doing so, I think it is fine. /rant

Ghotistyx.6942:

You forgot the 4th line:
“It’s snowing on Mt. Fuji”

If the event causing you to write the haiku is traumatical enough, you forget to add the 4th line.

Bhawb.7408:

Not quite on the level of gf left me coz of ladderboard but pretty solid, 7/10.

That post is really good, but hey. You’ve got to start somewhere.

Rest in Peace my boon
You came with health and life force
But left without friends

kittenpost aside, I’m a bit sad to see it go. It was a bit too strong, you became nigh immortal under the right circumstances. Though it won’t stop me from thinking that the nerf was a bit too harsh.

It’s over boys.

• Reaper—Blighter’s Boon: This trait now only procs for boons you apply to yourself. Increased healing level multiplier by 25%, increased healing attribute multiplier by 330%.

I’m not sure why this change was ever considered a good idea, sure our sustain was insane in Zergs (Why is this a problem? I want to nominate that for the worst argument in GW2, 2015. It looks like someone at Anet has some serious beef against the necro to me.) and in smaller group content we had very good sustain, but it always required a team effort(I wonder if any class has good sustain without team effort?).

On a more serious note I want you to consider the fact that Reaper wants to get up close and personal to deal damage and has no way of reliably evading damage other than dodges. To be able to do this and survive, the Reaper needs to be able to effectivly cycle through the resources Health and Life Force in order to sustain in a fight and in extension survive. Blighter’s Boon being triggered by allies boons was a necessity for this to work, with the new Blighter’s Boon our sustain from it is close to being literaly decimated in team content, while being better while solo.

It feels like whoever is in charge of balancing is looking of some things in a vacuum, while some are looked at in context. Blighter’s Boon seems sadly enough to have been looked at in context, while some things are seen as fine on their own and left as is, even if they are a lot stronger in groups.

Silverkey.2078:

Arche.7326:

Silverkey.2078:

I did update the wiki some hours ago, so the clef there should be the right ones (and the shroud is 0.6, 0.6, 1.2 etc…, I don’t know where you got your numbers)

Sat down with a calculator, and did some math. Unless there is a certain amount of power that should be used to get the exact number I’m unsure of what I’ve done wrong with the calculations.

In the PvP arena for example, with 2200 power, dust strike is 859 tooltip damage, life rend is 516. Since we agree on dust strike having a coef of 1.0, the coef of life rend is 516/859=0.6

One thing to be careful with: the RS damage does not depend on your equipped weapon (contrary to DS), it is the damage if you had an exotic 2-handed weapon (I think it’s a hammer to be precise).

I have not thought of it that way with the first calculation (516/859=0.6). But correct me if I’m wrong, doesn’t that mean that the avg weapon strength that RS uses is 1016? 516=(0.6*X*2200)/2600. Hammers average weapon strength for exotic should be 1048, which was what I used, but I’m probably just making a fool out of myself. As usual.

Edit: You get 0.6008 if you use 1015 as weapon power, which is that of a lvl 78 exotic hammer, might explain why I got hammer kills in RS last BWE and it makes some sense with the numbers you presented. Or I just made a fool of myself twice in the same post.

Silverkey.2078:

I did update the wiki some hours ago, so the clef there should be the right ones (and the shroud is 0.6, 0.6, 1.2 etc…, I don’t know where you got your numbers)

Sat down with a calculator, and did some math. Unless there is a certain amount of power that should be used to get the exact number I’m unsure of what I’ve done wrong with the calculations.

So I just got into the BWE and I decided to do some math, and was quite pleased with greatsword, shroud still needs some tweaking IMO. So, here are the coeffs and my comments on them:

Greatsword:
GS#1; 1.0/1.2/1.4, up from 0.85/0.95/1.1, chills on last strike.
Big improvement, damage wise from last time, 1.2 coeff/s instead of 1.03 coeff/s. It feels a lot more rewarding to use compared to last time, I think that it might need some increased damage still, as the dagger is way more reliant.

GS#2; 3, up from 2, resets if it hits foe below 50% hp.
Another big improvement, one that I’m very happy with, it hits for very large amounts, quite easily.

GS#3; 0.9, 12 vunlerability.
I don’t think that it needs a buff, it doesn’t feel as wonky as before, so I’m tempted to say that it is good as it is now.

GS#4; 0.7, pulses blind and cripple.
Without the animation lock it can be cast while moving, it is a big improvement but it could do with a slightly incresed radius.

GS#5; 1, pulls enemies in front of you close and knocks down. Applies chill instead of poison.
I like the poison to chill change, along with the targeting fixes it seems better, but I really feel like it should have a better range.

RS#1; 0.6/0.6/1.2, grants life force on final strike.
It seems to be unchanged, which I’m not very happy with. The damage is very low, worse than the old GS#1, but can be quite strong when traited with Dhuumfire. It should have seen a similar damage increase to Greatsword.

RS#2; 1.0, blinds on end of leap.
The targeting is fixed, causing it to spin inside of an enemy dealing some token damage if used in close range, feels great compared to last time, but it should probably travel a bit faster.

RS#3; Both stability and fear component has remained unchanged as far that I’m aware. It feels quite good and even though I’d like a instant cast fear on it I’m satisfied with it as is.

RS#4; 3. up from 2.8. Tooltip was fixed.
I still think that this skill needs a buff, it does too little direct damage for the channel time. A total coeff of 4.2 would be good for it.

RS#5; 1.5/2/2.5. Remained unchanged as far as I know.
Probably should do a bit more damage to make it compare to gravedigger better.

On another note, chill seems to have absolutley no effect on break bar enemies once the bar is down, same goes for cripple and blind. I think that they should have some effects, so that we can benefit from traits caring about chilled enemies.
That’s my comments on them after playing for a couple of hours. I’ll probably write more extensive feedback later.

When confronted with how much DPS Byron did they answered with this and this. Devs certainly have their sense of humor.

So, I did my daily Reddit reading and I found these interesting dev statements; this and this. I just felt like I would share it with this forum as well as it could be some good news for us.

The real question remains, how much DPS DOES Byron do?

Siva Mira.3546:

Thief only has ~17k HP and you can take 60k of damage?

I think it is time to nerf you.

I’m pretty sure that he died from that, it is his death recap. And I’m not entierly sure if you are sarcastic or not so I’ll refrain from writing a long list of why we shouldn’t nerf Necro.

Even if you made the damage D#1 final blow have a coeff of 2.1(same DPS as before, deals no damage on the two first attacks and stupid amounts of damage on the final) it would still be weaker than a the current AA, as one blow is easier to dodge than many smaller. Unless you are completly out of the loop you should know that what you try to do with the Dagger AA is found on the Greatsword, slow attacks that hit hard. The dagger AA is fine as it is right now, it is the other abilities that needs damage and effect boosts.

Instead of standardising the necro, which I belive you tried to do, with adding mobility and some support, see what the necro is good at, look at what it is supposed to do and how it is designed right now. Improve the strengths of the necro and make the drawbacks clear but balanced.

Instead of thinking “Necro has no mobility, so we give it mobility” think “What of the existing aspects of necromancer can we improve upon to make it a fair drawback”. If the answer turns out to be that no, it is absolutley vital that the necro gets a leap on dark pact, by all means do so. But you could just reduce the cast point to 0.2 and voila, now the enemy will be stuck with you for 3 seconds, allowing teammates and you to chase the escaping target down, unless he uses a cleanse. It works either way, but one will preserve the current necro and the other will not. I’m quite certain which I would choose.

For the support part, ask the question what is the necro thematiclay trying to do? Our support does not come from buffing our allies alot, but from inflicting debilitating conditions on our foes and corrupting boons as well as transferring allies conditions to the enemy instead. Does it work in theory? Yes, it does, if you have high uptime on weakness, chill, blind, poison and resonable amounts of fear as well as sending conditions to foes as well as boon corruption you have a scary support. So you take those things and see which weapons that can use them OH dagger, scepter, focus, axe and staff comes to mind. What can be done to improve them as weapons from a condition damage or support aspect? I can think of several suggestions, Dagger#4 inflicts fear for 1s, Dagger#5 inflicts 2 second base weakness and then 1 additional second for each stack of bleed on the foes, capped at 15 seconds total vulnerability, combos nicely with Scepter#2 and everyone that inflicts bleeding. Make Axe#3 grant you the boons that it corrupts and deal extra damage for each boon corrupted. Make a trait that gives staff marks a chance to refresh conditions inflicted by the necromancer when triggered. Focus#5 cast time reductions.

First of all, I can say that I wouldn’t play necromancer if these changes were implemented, apart from very low damage on auto attacks and skills, there are no damage multipliers among the traits. There is also heavily reduced sustain and self buffing but increased mobility.

What you gutted was our ability to do damage. Yes I agree, the spamming 1 thing is bad, but you do not solve the problem by gutting the damage and not giving any alternatives, look at dagger, it went from 1,33 coeff/s to 0.95 coeff/s, with no damage multipliers you are going to hit like a wet noodle. Life Blast got the same treatment.

ronpierce.2760:

Arche.7326:

It sounds nice, but I’ve noticed that “ok” does not cut it when it comes to raids and other end game content, be it in GW2 or other MMOs. I will remain sceptical but hopefull. If nothing else I will be able to give feedback in BWE about the Reaper. Which is gonna be good.

I suggest as it becomes available, try testing any harder PVE content with a support friend and give some two-sided feedback. That would do a huge favor to the developers. I feel part of the issue will be on the side of Supporters having to support someone that negates them. They seem to have ears open though, so all we can do now is wait, test and see what comes of it.

I will see if I can get my friend to support me. But what I’m concerned about the most now is that what we lack in support isn’t made up for in damage and survivability, the times where I need a heal I generaly swap to shroud, make sure that the water fields are ready and then jump out of it and get heals. It is an inconvenience but it can be partialy worked around in an organised group even if it is frustrating (don’t get me wrong it certainly needs fixes). But if there is no reason to take us into the content because we are too weak it becomes a non-issue.

On another note I assume that there will be a beta meetup with the top tier necromancers, if that is so, see if you can get spoj to attempt to solo Lupicus with the new Reaper.

It sounds nice, but I’ve noticed that “ok” does not cut it when it comes to raids and other end game content, be it in GW2 or other MMOs. I will remain sceptical but hopefull. If nothing else I will be able to give feedback in BWE about the Reaper. Which is gonna be good.

ESL decided to implement a couple of new rules, Rune of Vampirism is not allowed on ele and each team has to consist of at least 3 different professions. When they do that, something is wrong. In this case I’m pretty sure that it is D/D elementalist. One of the problems is that burning base damage is way too high, the damage should come from the scaling not base damage, and that ele is a bit overtuned in general in the damage department and some few things are a bit too good on the defensive.

I like the idea of “pooling” the heal and when exiting shroud getting a HoT that at most heals for 100% (times a multiplier of your Healing Power) of your HP. It could also be possible to have a hybrid solution, where 50% heals directly and 50% is pooled up.

Another idea that I got while reading this thread is that damage taken in shroud heals you for 15% of damage taken, 25% of healing goes through shroud and nearby deaths heal for 10% of the dead units maximum HP.
It would mean that healing works, but is not as effective as it would be if you were outside of shroud. Damage to health gives some base health when you are tanking damage and it will add up, especialy in Reapers shroud, you are very unlikely to ever get more than 15% of your maximum health in a fight that actually matters from this. The last part gives more sustain versus many enemies, assuming that they die.
We could also have self heal values (leech or blighters boon) in Shroud doubled along with letting a part of normal healing through.

Good of you to bump it, as you said, it becomes more important now that raids are around the corner.

I think he means PvP finisher, as in it instantly kills of downed enemeis. Personaly I love the idea, but it would be too strong on a 30 second cooldown. I do however think that the >25% bonus should apply to downed targets, which I forgot to test during the last BWE.

Silverkey.2078:

Arche.7326:

Effectivly we get roughly 30% more DPS than dagger if we spam gravedigger if a foe is below 50% hp. The coeff/s is 1.5 for gravedigger (new one) and 1.33 for dagger. But if you miss with gravedigger you are losing out on alot of damage. We will see how it turns out soon.

Yes but there is about 10% increase weapon strength. So at the end, gravedigger used to give almost the same DPS as dagger AA but is now 50% higher.

Gravedigger: (1.5*1047.5*2200)/2600=1330
Dagger#1: (952.5*1.33*2200)/2600=1072

If I did my math correctly that is the “tooltip” DPS with 2200 power, with the new changes.

Silverkey.2078:

With gravedigger damage increase by 50%, we now give effectively 50% more damage than dagger AA when an enemy is below 50%. I haven’t calculated how good the DPS is below 50%, but that is still at least a 25% increase DPS compared to what we used to have + blind on the same weapon, good burst vulnerability, etc… while still keeping the amazing self-buffing and PUG efficiency that necro always had. This will be a clear improvement in our acceptance rate in LFG.

And indeed, in challenging group content, necro/reaper will most likely perform better comparatively:

• extra survivability without speccing for it
• weakness, blinds
• vuln will probably be harder to cap
• most likely some boons to play with (we have already seen it in open-world in HoT)
• most likely more conditions to cleanse

Effectivly we get roughly 30% more DPS than dagger if we spam gravedigger if a foe is below 50% hp. The coeff/s is 1.5 for gravedigger (new one) and 1.33 for dagger. But if you miss with gravedigger you are losing out on alot of damage. We will see how it turns out soon.

Cele signet necro is one of the few reliable counters to ele, maybe that is why it is in 4th place?

Inferior to Berserker.

Bhawb, I just have to ask you, do you think that the damage on life blast is low compared to what the Dagger? Considering the whole “melee deals more damage because of increased risks” thing and that Life Force and Shroud is our profession mechanic. I’ve expressed my oppinion, but I’m curious on yours (and the other big names within the necro community).

Robert Gee.9246:

-snip-
On the topic of increasing the cast speed of Life Blast: I think we would need to lower the damage multiplier if we wanted to increase the cast speed. The damage per second on that skill at its current cast time is already about as high as we are comfortable with. It’s a tricky skill to balance because we’d need to also look at adjusting all the traits that affect it.

The dps is a full 0.3 coeff/s behind the dagger auto chain. That is a substantial difference. Currently, there is no point in using shroud for damage other than in small bursts and for bunkering. I find it natural that the best way of dealing damage would be to use your profession mechanic. Lower the cast time to 0.7, that gives it more balance when compared to Reaper Shroud #1, and have the range>600 coeff be 0.7 and the range<600 be 0.85. I fail to see how it is overpowered this way, it is 0.12 coeff/s behind dagger when below 600 range and 0.3 coeff/s when above 600. It is not worse than if someone were to start shanking you with the dagger. You could always nerf dagger to allow for competition, but that is the worst idea by far.

First of the damage numbers are just pathetic and Range should be globaly increased to 900 on axe, up from 600.

Axe Skill #1, Rending Claws a coeff of at least 1 instead of 0.7. It is on ranged and it is single target, so it should be lower than dagger coeff/s wise. Axe auto seems to be a 1 sec auto with afterswing and so a 1 coeff/s for it along with the vulnerability application seems reasonable. I would also like to see a vuln increase per stack to 3 or an increase in duration to 10 (instead of 7). Preferably the 3 vuln. This makes for a nice setup for burst.

Axe Skill #2, Ghastly Claws deals low damage and generates LF. All it needs is a damage and range increase. The damage coeff should be 4 for the total channel, possibly a bit higher and but definitly not below 4. This skill is similar to Rapid Fire, but it does not apply vulnerability by itself and has a shorter range, cooldown is two seconds shorter, down at 8 compared to Rapidfires 10. It deals more damage at a shorter range and at a lower CD and is also not a finisher.

Axe Skill #3, Unholy Feast is a skill that I thematicaly wondered why it didn’t steal boons. So my suggestion is simple, remove the retaliation part and instead grant the remaining duration of the boon removed to the Necromancer, and of course convert it to a condition on the target from which it was stolen. I would like it to strip two boons on each target (and steal them, of course), but considering what happens if you were to hit 5 targets and steal two from each it might be a bit too strong, increased cooldown to 20 might be a solution. I would also increase the coeff to 1.3 (up from 0.8) and add an additional 0.3 coeff damage when a boon stolen/converted. If you were to steal two boons this way the skill would hit like Lich Form #1 Deathly Claws. I would also like for Necros to have reliable access to blast finishers and this skill would suit it perfectly, make it one. And maybe increase the CD to 20.

But that’s just my thoughts on Necro Axe.

Sigmoid.7082:

-snip-

If the number was any higher it would be to strong in single combat and for low hp/high armour builds. Considering when used you can leave shroud with having healed 10~30% of you hp isnt bad.

Its a defensive trait that scales with the number of combatants that are there. The more allies and enemies there are the better it becomes hence why its ok. A 15% attack speed increase is nice but its dependent on low long you are in shroud for. There can be a lot of time where the trait is doing nothing for you.

I dont think its designed to be amazing when your own your own.

It isn’t designed to be amazing when on my own, but it should at least be passable for solo play. I don’t feel like it is. I tried some 1v1 and most of the time the most heal you got from it was 10% often less (depending on how much my opponent hit me for), and that was on Cavaliers. For high HP builds it is ok for generating lots of life force, but not worth taking over attack speed and CDR.

It’s shaping up.

Sigmoid.7082:

Arche.7326:

I used it in the last BWE (because Reapers Onslaught was bugged) and it was not that impressive, sure it was nice to have in the middle of the zerg, but compared to a 15% DPS increase coupled with 5 second CDR on kill in shroud, it is too weak.

I would actually say its better than onslaught in zergs because it allows you to cycle you pools. As in you will always enter shroud with max shroud and while you are in shroud you will always leave with more hp than you went in with.

It is probably considered to be a bit better in zergs, but the numbers still should be increased by a bit. I felt that the amount of buffs should have a larger impact on my HP. I ran around in valkyrie armor and my LF went up really fast, but my HP did not. It felt better with full Zerker gear or Cavaliers, but with Vitality gear I wouldn’t say it was worth taking (granted we never got our hands on the 15% attack speed increase, so I can’t really say for sure). Outside of Zergs and organised groups, it felt very lackluster.

I used it in the last BWE (because Reapers Onslaught was bugged) and it was not that impressive, sure it was nice to have in the middle of the zerg, but compared to a 15% DPS increase coupled with a 5 second CDR on kill in shroud, it is too weak.

edit: Fixed a random kitten.

I’m happy so see so many suggestions of mine and others ending up in this post, it feels like we finaly changed something for the better. That said, Reaper is probably going to be a monster next BWE. Gravedigger spam will be top tier DPS and with Reapers Onslaught working shroud will be quite powerfull. The only thing that remains now is to wait for the next BWE so that we can get our hands on the new stuff.

Lily.1935:

Lightsbane.9012:

the trait reaper’s onslaught should probably be a minor, or at least in a lower tier. and should also affect the greatsword as well.

You mean Adept. But yeah, I wasn’t at all impressed with that trait. It gave instant cool down to a skill with a really low cool down as is and the 15% attack speed wasn’t noticeable in the slightest. Maybe instead of it recharging death’s charge it made your attacks deal 10% more damage against chilled foes?

Edit: Just some I’m perfectly clear This should stay a grandmaster. The 10% damage boost I was suggesting was in that light.

The trait was bugged in the beta if I remember correctly, so it didn’t work at all. 15% increased attack speed equals a 15% DPS increase, so the base for the trait is quite good.

Anchoku.8142:

Hey, now, let’s not be totally negative. Beta weekend has given a lot of great feedback. There should be changes based on how players generally feel.

Arenanet likes to be cautious on adjustments and will probably creep up on a satisfying balance rather than turning the amp up to eleven and making Necromancer better than Elementalist.

How do you think Ele mains feel? It’s like they wanted our peanut butter and got more chocolate, instead.

They have indeed been given alot of great feedback, especialy from the Necros, when I counted we had more feedback than the rest combined (Measured in text. I blame you Bhawb). I’m more worried about that the other classes will experience power creep during our creep to power than I am about their ability to make use of our feedback.

Also, who would want peanut butter instead of chocolate?

Bhawb.7408:

I have no clue what is going on for Necromancer, only that someone I know is extremely happy with how Robert Gee is responding to Chronomancer feedback and the changes he’s seen.

I was considering the fact that there is a posibility for our feedback to have parts of it be implemented to be “almost too good to be true”. In all seriousness though, the fact that they did something with Revenant made me hope that something could be done for Necro, but it could have been because that the profession was new. But when you said (indirectly) that the Mesmers has their feedback listened to I thought that the same thing probably was going to happen to us.

Bhawb.7408:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Oh, I know that the build we played on was an old one, I just have to laugh about it. Hopefully, these “compensations” will be addressed for the next BWE.

Bare minimum, the longer cooldown on Grasp of Darkness could have easily been reverted in time for the first beta, since it is just one number and not a functionality change.

One of my friends who seems to be really good at knowing what goes on behind the doors (no clue how, but he’s always right) says Gee has been listening to feedback and already made great adjustments to Mesmer. I’m confident that I and many others have made great feedback, and we’ve got at least two forum dudes (Rising Dusk and that other guy I forgot the name of) who have been submitting great feedback on our behalf, so I’d say we’re in a very good spot to get changes. Gee seems to be the most willing to implement new ideas in response to feedback, and we have given him a lot to work with.

Sounds too good to be true, but you are not exactly known for lying so I’ll take your word for it. Even if not all the changes we wanted are getting implemented I’m sure we will have time to give feedback on that during other beta weekends.

DeceiverX.8361:

Agreed with most of the OP, but I don’t think Soul Spiral needs to be stronger. I was reaching 10-16k’s in WvW on most targets, and as an AOE with all the poison damage it ticks for, that ends up being a hell of a lot of damage.

That said, I think Soul Spiral could use a cooldown reduction if not much changes with the RS auto. Something like 25s would feel a lot better for the natural flow of the class, even if the damage has to be cut by a small percentage (like 15%).

Soul spiral deals (not counting poison) less DPS than spamming the auto attack. It would be roughly 40% better (dps wise) if it was not bugged with the actual channel being 2.9, not 2 as tooltip stated, that along with the posion and the skill would be fine. So if you consider that a buff, yes, then it should be buffed, if not; I do not think it needs to be stronger.

Dakunaito.9602:

hammer Warrior does autoattack chain in 1.7s

Its 2.75s according to wiki. Just wanting to point that out.

spoj.9672:

I think most people are in agreement Reaper is too slow and does too little damage. Greatsword is unimpressive. Shouts are also rather uninspired especially against fewer foes. RS is really fun and pretty close to being good. It just needs some numbers tweaks but feel wise its there.

Heres the feedback i wrote and passed along through Miku to the devs if anyones interested.
http://pastebin.com/az4WCN6r

I wish I had someone to pass my calculations to so that the devs could see them XD instead of hoping that they just randomly read them.
Anyway, I think I can agree to just about all of the points you make.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Arche.7326:

Bhawb, since you asked for coeff/s and I can inform you that they are about the same as the close range coeffs (a bit lower actualy) of life blast, which are 1 coeff/s (If you haven’t already checked it). The whole math can be found on the reddit reaper BW1 feedback thread, the post is linked on the top of the page.

Yes, but you hit much faster in Reaper’s Shroud. The per-hit coefficient can be lower, since you hit so much more often.

I was talking about just that, the coefficient per second. RS#1 are about the same as Life Blast coeff/s.

Bhawb, since you asked for coeff/s and I can inform you that they are about the same as the close range coeffs (a bit lower actualy) of life blast, which are 1 coeff/s (If you haven’t already checked it). The whole math can be found on the reddit reaper BW1 feedback thread, the post is linked on the top of the page.

I’ve posted coeff/s numbers that gives one a good idea of how terrible of a situation it is in, on the GW2 forums and and on this reddit thread along with suggestions on how to improve it. I must say that I was hoping for more coeff theorycrafting, as I am unsure if my views are shared by others.

spoj.9672:

Scary how similar some of the suggestions are to the pastebin i wrote. I was probably a bit more generous with buffing stuff but then i was primarily looking at PvE balance and closely commenting on damage numbers.

I really like your second suggestion for greatsword auto-attack. Didnt consider that for the chill duration problem.

Could we get a link to that? I’m curious to see what numbers you came up with.

Blood Red Arachnid.2493:

Anchoku.8142:

GS has a lot of AoE so of course it should be weaker against single targets. The problem I have is that range is too close to dagger. It should be a bit longer, perhaps 240 minimum.

Its called opportunity cost. The greatsword takes forever to preform its attacks. Because of this, the GS will lose a lot of damage whenever any of these situations arise:

#1: You’re forced to dodge or get out of the way of an enemy attack.
#2: You are interrupted before finishing the long windup
#3: The enemy is killed before you can launch the attack.
#4: The enemy gets knocked away before the attack can finish.
#5: The enemy downs you before you can down it.
#6: The GS is not fighting multiple tightly packed targets.

The problem is exacerbated greatly by the following fact: Reaper Shroud’s auto attack has, unboosted, higher DPS than the greatsword. It his the same amount of targets, but does so faster. So really greatsword has no excuse.

When I did the math, the greatsword seemed to have better DPS by around 7% compared to the Shroud, assuming everything hits.

Silverkey.2078:

Bhawb.7408:

Silverkey.2078:

• Gravedigger: this skill just does not have enough damage. It needs to be stronger than dagger AA by a decent margin to make it worth it considering it is SO EASY to dodge. Currently dagger AA is more powerful… if a-net is afraid of high numbers, just reduce a bit the cast time and reduce a lot the after cast.

I disagree, especially if the Ice Field idea is taken. As long as it doesn’t totally get crapped on DPS wise (which it wouldn’t in either of my suggestions), the utility of chill would more than make up for a small DPS loss in anything except PvE.

I think you are confusing with the AA. I’m speaking about the supposed executioner skill which is too weak to execute anything.

I think he means that the Ice Whirl Finisher that could come after the finishing Auto Attack Ice field should make up for the damage loss.