Guild Wars 2

Just some raw ideas:

Chilling Victory: Striking a chilled foe grants might and life force. Increased max might cap from 25 to 30

Deathly Chill: Chill causes an impact of (power) damage on application. Might now increases you power and condition damage by 35 per stack instead of 30.

Scourge:

Scourge seemed to have a very good AoE condi damage, which i guess its fair considering how easily it can be to focus down a necro (and scourge is no exception), also i think Demonic Lore was bugged (no ICD on downed targets) which made Scourge`s damage looks more ``OP`` than it really is.

Torch skills seemed solid imo.

Barrier is a very interesting idea for support, but as it is right now it just starts decaying way too fast, maybe increasing the time before it starts decaying to 4 seconds instead of 2 would make it good enough.

Punishment skills while good in PvP will probably be very underwhelming in PvE, mostly because of the boon requirement to inflict torment and cripple. My suggestion would be to change Punishments in PvE so they can apply the torment and cripple even if a boon is not removed. Also having a cast time on Sand Swell felt kinda clunky.

Last but not least please dont nerf Scourge`s damage in PvE because of PvP whine before we even get a chance to try the spec properly in PvE =)

In my opnion chilling darkness should get merged with another trait in Reaper`s line, like could shoulder(i mean, this trait was totaly created thinking on reaper right? Even the nerf came because it would be too strong with reaper…) and we should get another adept tier trait
Maybe with that it would be fair to increase the ICD to 10s as at this point it would only be a bonus to any reaper build

Parasict contagion would be way more considerable if it worked on shroud

For lingering curses i would love see it as a party wide buff, like spotter, that gives expertise so it could be useful even if you`re not running a condi build youself, if you have a condi centered group

So what about making it so BB procs on allies defensive boons like regen/prot/vigor/resistance/aegis on top of any boons the Reaper aplies to himself(as we pretty much only stack might) ? It would stop the excessive boon spam as it mostly comes from outside might and swiftness. From this point foward it could use some testing to see if it stills needs a ICD.
The way it was nerfed, just completely removing the factor that made Reapers good at team fights was just too harsh…

Robert Gee.9246:

Carlos.7915:

I guess necromancers need to live in their own instances apart from the rest of the game, not being able to support or receive support

I’m fairly confident that boons will still apply their effects to necromancers even if this trait is not equipped.

Except regeneration/any heals while we are in shroud, BB was actually a great trait for team oriented fights filling our gap on sustain in team fights, but now its only really useful with spite. which takes away even more diversity (as pretty much all builds need to go soul reaping for vital persistence)

Really sad with this one…
When we finally had a way to really benefit from outside support…
I guess necromancers need to live in their own instances apart from the rest of the game, not being able to support or receive support
And now Reaper only really has 1 GM trait worth the slot

Some changes i would like to see to improve necros support:

Axe:
AA: is now a chain with 3 attacks, the first 2 stacks vuln and the last one corrupts one boon

Unholy Feast: is now a blast finisher

Focus:
Reapers Touch: gives fury/retaliation instead of regen

Warhorn:
Locust Swarm: share its effects to allies

Traits:
Parasict Contagion: a percentage of your condi damage heals you and nearby allies

Lingering Curses: now a AoE buff that increases your and allies condi damage

Beyond the Veil: now aplies protection to allies too instead of only you and minions

Remove Quickening Thrist and bring back Renewing Blast on its place

Vampiric Rituals: wells apply protection to allies when cast and when they end too

Utillities:

Wells of power and darkness: reduce cooldown to 40s

Well of blood: is now a water field

Signet of Undeath: change its active effect to be a buff that reduces incoming damage to allies bellow 50% health for a short period

PS: Corruptions in my opnion are the skills that need a bigger rework to be made useful, maybe making them upkeep skills with improved effects but gives debuffs to you in exchange?
Just a random example: Epidemic – keeps the same effect on use, while keeping this skill on spreads 2 condis on you to nearby foes(3s ICD), conditions applied to you do increased damage (15% more damage(?))

My feedback will be mostly on a PVE point of view:

Greatsword:
So to start of, i dont think the DPS GS brings will be enough to bring us into a wanted spot for challenging content, most of the time you have to cancel your auto chain/graveddiger to avoid an attack as we have no blocks/invun to secure landing a hit without dying

GS1: could still use a little damage buff
GS2: need a cast time reduction to 1 second to be more reliable
GS3: has a pretty long cast time for what it does, could use a cast time reduction too
GS4: is a pretty good skill in my opnion
GS5: its a unreliable skill , a lot of times the target just stops half way through

Shroud:
So i must say that Vital Persistence is way too importante to be able to stay in shroud for a decent period, otherwise it just melts. Its a issue with death shroud too but its more glaring with reaper shroud as you`ll be at meele range. Vital persistance needs to be baseline or it`ll hit reaper build diversity way too hard

RS1: its in a good spot in my opnion
RS2: feels really satisfying using it as a gap closer now
RS3: feels kind weird with terrifying not being instant cast
RS4: feels really good
RS5: could use a damage buff, i know its a stun and a ice field, but still falls way behind graveddiger

Shouts:
I really wanted to use then, but the way they are now i find myself wanting to use most of them instead of other skills

YSIM: not that bad, but i dont find myself wanting it over other heals
Rise: i dont plan on running minions, so i dont have much to say about it
NCSY: would be really good if the unblockable was shared to allies too, as it is now its just one more selfish skill that give us unblockable when we already have a lot of skills that are unblockable
Suffer: worst shout in my opnion, i really cant see a use for it as we have way better condi transfers, maybe making so it create a small ice field on the foot of targets hit by the skill? Would give us more ways to combo with the finishers that we are finally getting as well as keeping the theme of beeing the shout that chills
YAAW: again another selfish skills doing things that we already have a good access to, my suggestion would be to change the might to fury/retaliation and make it applies to allies too (the duration depending on the number of targets hit of couse)
CTTB: still feels as the cast time is too big, should decrease it to 60s

Traits:
Most traits feels really good but Augury of Death and Soul Eater are still lackluster

Augury of Death: i think the life siphon on shouts fits really bad on them, my suggestion would be to remove the siphon and make so shouts share up to 2 boons on us to nearby allies, it would be a way to improve necros support options by a little bit

Soul Eater: again the life siphon fits really bad, but i dont really have a suggestion on this one, maybe making so gravedigger corrupt a boon on use?

With that being said, i want to thanks you guys at the balance team for all the hard work, hopefully the feedback given on this thead can help to make reaper even better

What i would like to see

Reaper’s Touch – replace the regeneration with retaliation or fury

Spinal Shivers – decrease the cast time to 1 second

Lily.1935:

I’ve already made a suggestion for axe that would turn it into a hybrid weapon. As a Pure condi weapon it doesn’t really fit. As it is its sorta sitting in the middle of so many different play styles and doesn’t work for any of them very well. Its never been a very powerful weapon, by any stretch of the imagination.

How I’d change it is I’d first make the skill one into a chain skill. 1st damage valn, 2nd damage valn, 3rd damage and boon corruption. Second skill would damage at its 600 range but also damage up to 3 targets at melee range as well as become a whirl finisher. This makes it a very good hybrid weapon but still very functional as a power weapon if needed. Making it stronger the closer you get like reverse mesmer gs or ranger lb could give it a unique feel to it. Unlike Life blast which has always been just really really off.

Thats pretty much what ive been thinking would be a good role for axe in a good time. Keep the vuln on the two first hits and make a third hit which removes a boon on hit, change unholy fervor to: reduce recharge of axe skills, the third hit of rending claws now corrupts a boon instead of just removing it.

Also make unholy feast a blast finisher, i know we arent supose to have many of those, but i dont think having 1 reliable blast would be OP as axe itself is not a DPS focused weapon and would bring a new type of group support to necro as well as making people actually think of giving a try to spiteful spirit.

As for scepter i dont really have many ideas, but i would love it increasing the effect of incoming conditions to the target instead of just applying a lot of condis. Like for example making feast of corruption giving a debuff to the oponente that lasts for 5 seconds and make all condis applied to the target within that time to do increased damage.

Its great the way it is now ;D

Really cool changes! Reaper definitely was needing some adjustments, looking forward to try reaper again now!

I know its not really reaper related but Robert could you please consider making Vital Persistence baseline? It`s a very important trait that pretty much every necro build has and having to go SR for that trait really hurts necromancer build diversity

As you guys know one of the main issues and motives why Anet always hesitate on adding new things for necros is that we have ``a second health bar`` so what about giving new uses to LF?

For example:

Shadow Rush(F2 skill)
The necromancer uses 50% LF to leap towards the target
1200 range
10 sec CD

Deathly Gift(F3 skill)
The necromancer uses 30% LF to give 2 random boons to himself and up to 5 nearby allies for 10 seconds
600 radius
10 sec CD

Life Force Overflow(F4 skill)
The necromancer uses 30% LF to overflow the life force from his body blasting the nearby area (similar effect to Arcane Wave)
600 radius
Combo Finisher : Blast
5 sec CD

This way we would have to choice on a certain situation if we want to be more tanky with DS or if we want a little more mobility(F2) or group support(F3, F4)

Obs: remember that this would benefit more power builds than condition builds because power weapons have way more LF regen than condi weapons

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

The necromancer

-Will never be desired in dungeons, unless they receive a Cleave skill.
-Will never have any use for boon removal in PVE, unless boon removal actually becomes a thing in PVE. Right now it is irrelevant.
-Will never find a good use for conditions in PVE, unless PVE is changed to be not so anti-conditions. The condition cap has to go.
-Will never have a use for control skills in boss battles, unless Defiant/Unshakeable is changed. Right now control skills are rendered useless against bosses.
-Death Shroud will never work well, unless is changed so that it no longer is an obstruction to our class. We should be able to heal in DS (untraited) and we should be able to use our utility skills in DS.

Our class is fundamentally broken in PVE from the ground up. The entire design of PVE contradicts our class’ core features. And yet with any balance podcast, our class is quickly skipped as if it does not matter.

We necromancers feel like a neglected child.

Yep, seems like devs really only care for PvP balance, not a single coment on for making the necro wanted in PvE, and devs saying the necro fills the attrition role and have good sustain just killed my hopes for any improvements to power builds

Necromancer:

Strengths:
-Condition application and manipulation
-High AoE condition application
-High health bar

Weaknesses:
-Bad Power burst (ranged and meele)
-Lack of ways to keep on attrition (no stab, no gap closers, bad pulls)
-Vulnerability to CC
-Lack of party support

Kryptonite:
-CC-focused builds

What i think necros need the most at the moment is a weapon with a cleave auto-attack and group support(mainly for PVE)

One of the main reasons people hesitate when it comes to giving more support capabilities is that they would be able to do so much while still having good amount of tankyness(DS) so my proposal would be giving more uses to DS like:

Shadow Rush(F2 skill)
The necromancer uses 50% LF to leap towards the target
1200 range
20 sec CD

Deathly Gift(F3 skill)
The necromancer uses 30% LF to give 2 random boons to himself and up to 5 nearby allies for 10 seconds
600 radius
15 sec CD

Life Force Overflow(F4 skill)
The necromancer uses 30% LF to overflow the life force from his body blasting the nearby area (similar effect to Arcane Wave)
600 radius
Combo Finisher : Blast
10 sec CD

This way we would have to choice on a certain situation if we want to be more tanky with DS or if we want a little more mobility(F2) or group support(F3, F4)

Its the way i can think of balancing support for necros without letting they keep all theirs tanky capabilities

Andele.1306:

NeXeD.3042:

Whoever said we don’t physically hit anything with our weapons… are you sure dagger doesn’t hit? Give us a scythe and a bow, the bow shoots poisonous kitten, the scythe shoots bhawbs.

Dagger causes spectral cuts and a bite (green slashes in black mist caused by it), it physically doesnt actually hit the enemy if you check it out (physical hit from all other weapons have those rocky/blob particles with white slashes).

Im not saying youre wrong or something like that but causing ``spectral cuts`` is at least a very poor excuse for why we can use dagger and not other weapons , i mean, if we can cause spectral cuts with dagger why couldnt we do it with a sword or fire spectral arrows with a bow?

I would love Longbow for ranged power and Sword for meele cleave dps

Konig Des Todes.2086:

There is no “M”. There is only E.

Which, given we don’t know E’s gender, it could be E who bought Canach’s billet. But my guess is still Countess Anise or Lady Wi.

E, I think, will be the Master of Peace. Why? “Master of” feels very reminiscent of Master of Whispers (and Zephyrites hold a strong Elonian tie along with Canthan tie), and he’d be interested in the politics of the world (balancing peace and whatnot), and there’s hints of the Zephyrites holding something of interest for Season 2 – and we’re told we’ll know who E is by the end of Season 2. Faren’s still my second guess for E, just because it’d be a fun plot twist and Faren does tend to stick his nose… oh, just about everywhere political.

Yes sir i forgot the letter ;P
I think E is a better bet as we`ll likely get to know who is she on S2 and this Festival is pretty much a prelude for S2 it would be a good way to put her on the current story

Maybe ``M``? ;o

girien.1209:

Because the ONLY weakness in necro is CCing him. High HP, DS, insane (and totally OP) damage, I Win button (lich form), etc.

And I say that some warrior says to me (thief) “if you want stability, take dagger storm and cancel it…”. Do the same with plage/liche form….

If you cancel plague/lich form you lose all the stability.

And really reading some coments here it seems like people think that DS is a godmode offensive/defensive/attrition mechanic while its not even close to any of that. Try playing some few hours and you`ll see.

DS doesnt give us any proper way to keep ourselves in attrition(which is our class philosophy) neither does cripple or chill.

We should have a reliable way to stands our own ground againts the CC rain at least for a few seconds, i cant see how giving SoL like 5s of stability could be that overpowered, it`ll just give a reason to use a skill currently useless (at least on pvp ).

I think it should be something like ``teleport you to your target within 1200 range`` it would not make us able to escape from fights but would improve our chase abilities, our class philosophy is that we `` should be the dude you CANNOT get away from`` after all.

I think Enfeebling Blood doesnt need a blast finisher, its good as it is now, Enfeeble on the other hand could get a blast
Maybe Banshee`s Wail could makes Locust Swarm blast with every 5 pulses, starting on the first pulse

As you guys know one of the main issues and motives why Anet always hesitate on adding new things for necros is that we have ``a second health bar`` so what about giving new uses to LF?

For example:

Shadow Rush(F2 skill)
The necromancer uses 50% LF to leap towards the target
1200 range
10 sec CD

Deathly Gift(F3 skill)
The necromancer uses 30% LF to give 2 random boons to himself and up to 5 nearby allies for 10 seconds
600 radius
10 sec CD

Life Force Overflow(F4 skill)
The necromancer uses 30% LF to overflow the life force from his body blasting the nearby area (similar effect to Arcane Wave)
600 radius
Combo Finisher : Blast
5 sec CD

This way we would have to choice on a certain situation if we want to be more tanky with DS or if we want a little more mobility(F2) or group support(F3, F4)

Obs: remember that this would benefit more power builds than condition builds because power weapons have way more LF regen than condi weapons

dancingmonkey.4902:

Carlos.7915:

We are designed to be able to put pressure on the oponente while being able to stand our own ground and not being CCed to death, having stability on a skill that has no real purpose on the current meta is not a bad idea.

Umm, I am looking at Jonathan Sharp’s write up on balance philosophies by profession right now, and it says nothing close to what you suggest the profession is designed for here.

``The necro boasts the highest natural health of all the caster classes, and also has death shroud to extend that life total even higher. While they don’t have some of the escape or damage reduction capabilities that other classes boast, they do have a lot of ways to win attrition fights.``
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/info/updates/Game-Update-Notes-December-14-2012#post999247
``The Necro, on the other hand, should be the dude you CANNOT get away from. It’s an attrition based class``
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/necromancer/PHEW/first#post612396
We currently dont have many ways to win attrition fights btw

CC is designed to be the weakness of the, claimed by the devs, attrition class? Mobility is designed to be our weakness.
We are designed to be able to put pressure on the oponente while being able to stand our own ground and not being CCed to death, having stability on a skill that has no real purpose on the current meta is not a bad idea.

Healing Power(Major) / Power / Precision
Power(Major)/ Healing Power / Precision
Power(Major) / Boon Duration / Precision

Good idea, invite me please =)