Guild Wars 2

Actually it is dead because of more general power creep.

It does include conditions though. Conditions used to be much harder to apply. However they dished out condi cleanses and immunities to everyone so now to be useful conditions need to be significantly applied. In the first 2 years of the game it was fun to apply and remove conditions because they were both done less often and this created a back and forth as to when to cleanse and when to apply conditions. The trait merge patch changed all this. You will never ever be in a situation where this game is fun again.

Basically this is an example of why power creep lead to an unfun playing experience. The game is focused on pve though, so it is what it is. If you are playing a pve game for some amazing pvp content then you are really making a big mistake.

SuperKorean.7345:

Thief Shortbow 5 is the most overpowered skill in this game.

Let me give you 1 Example =

A.

1. You encounter Thief.

2. Your health is low and your defensive skills are on cool-down.

3. The Thief will chase you down , you die , you have to wait for the re-spawn.

4. Result = The Enemy Team will gain more points.

B.

1. You encounter Thief.

2. The Thief makes mistake and the Thief’s health is low.

3. The Thief will run away with 20% health and go decap or +1 somewhere else.

4. Result = The Enemy Team will gain points.

Whether A or B happens, You encounter Thief. -> The Enemy Team will gain points.

Why ?

Because Thief has superior mobility.

If you make mistake , you will die. You cannot run away from Thief mobility.

If the Thief makes mistake , the Thief will run away and do something else.

You cannot chase down the Thief’s mobility.

Even if the Thief lose fights , the Thief can just run away from the fight,
and contribute points by decaping or +1 somewhere else.

Only the Thief can do this, the other 8 classes cannot do this.

If the other 8 classes lose fights, they die and they have to wait for re-spawn.

Only a Thief can chase down a Thief and finish off a Thief.

If your team doesn’t have Thief and the other team has Thief, the enemy Thief will run around all over the map and your team cannot counter this.

How to fix this?

Shortbow 5 Initiative cost should be increased. Or reduce the range down to 600.

And also, Shadow Step cooldown should be 60 sec. Or reduce the range down to 900.

And also, add 20 sec internal cool-down to the “Unhindered Combatant Dash” Trait

By the way, Thief is my most played class. I played Thief for more than 10,000 hours.

You are correct and they should be nerfed. Shadowstep as a utility is really OP. It should have been nerfed a long time ago. It wont happen though.

Every class is unfun to play against. That is why the game died.

Mel.3064:

Lordrosicky.5813:

Mel.3064:

Lordrosicky.5813:

A few people get to play monthlies again…who cares?!?!? It is actually a disadvantage to their lives to be allowed to play this game because it isn’t a productive investment of time. They could be getting top grades or working their way up to get a good job but instead they are putting another year after another year into a dead game. The joke is on them. They are punishing themselves. That 2k hours a year they spend on gw2 duelling 1v1 on mine could be invested into something productive.

Guess what, everything you do in live is ultimately a waste of time. So might as well spend it on a game. Everything will die, cool down and the universe will be forever dead.

lol no its not dude. Playing a dead game for serious business is a waste of time. There are tons of things in life that help you achieve things. Your attitude sounds poor to me. Always try to be productive and to advance your life. That is what it is all about, that isnt a waste of time at all.

No point in “advancing” anything if you dont enjoy it. You cannot take anything with you into your grave, same for your potential children.

Advancing your life is not something that you won’t enjoy. My point is that playing this game seriously is incredibly unproductive. Sure you can do it if you like but it is a waste of time. Time that can be better spent doing a bunch of other things which will help you achieve happiness and self worth. And will help you achieve something in life. I dont want to be on my death bed and think back to wasting 7 years playing guild wars 2 seriously when the game is nothing. If you want that then that is your choice. But I am saying that it is not a big deal these people playing gw2. Banning them from gw2 would likely be doing them a favour in the longer term.

Mel.3064:

Lordrosicky.5813:

A few people get to play monthlies again…who cares?!?!? It is actually a disadvantage to their lives to be allowed to play this game because it isn’t a productive investment of time. They could be getting top grades or working their way up to get a good job but instead they are putting another year after another year into a dead game. The joke is on them. They are punishing themselves. That 2k hours a year they spend on gw2 duelling 1v1 on mine could be invested into something productive.

Guess what, everything you do in live is ultimately a waste of time. So might as well spend it on a game. Everything will die, cool down and the universe will be forever dead.

lol no its not dude. Playing a dead game for serious business is a waste of time. There are tons of things in life that help you achieve things. Your attitude sounds poor to me. Always try to be productive and to advance your life. That is what it is all about, that isnt a waste of time at all.

A few people get to play monthlies again…who cares?!?!? It is actually a disadvantage to their lives to be allowed to play this game because it isn’t a productive investment of time. They could be getting top grades or working their way up to get a good job but instead they are putting another year after another year into a dead game. The joke is on them. They are punishing themselves. That 2k hours a year they spend on gw2 duelling 1v1 on mine could be invested into something productive.

tl-dr: you can undermine any tournament you like, so you can make a smurf account, mess around in a tournament, throw games, insult people…whatever you want. And they cant touch your main account.

Get to it everyone. The precedent has been set. You are all free to make smurfs and troll safe in the knowledge anet wont do anything but ban that account

It is because of expectations. A mesmer and a thief, for example, they are used to being the best classes in pvp because they have been for most of the games history. So if they were ever “balanced” objectively then they would feel like they are underpowered (even though they aren’t) because their sub-conscious expectation is to be overpowered.

The opposite is true of necro. In pvp for most of the game’s existence the necro has been the worst class, or one of the worst classes with fringe uses. I would say the ranger is the most similar in pvp, both have been pretty bad on average over the game’s duration.

Anyway, the necro has the expectation of being bad because that is all they have ever known. We get so many necros saying “o that would be op if we had that”, but it wouldnt be OP. It would be fine because classes like mesmer can chain invulns for about 30 seconds. So if necro is objectively balanced then people think it is OP because the expectation is that it will be bad.

The base case for necro is the lowest in the game because it has been the worst class in the game in pvp and pve (on average) over the course of the entire games history. So necro will always be balanced to be bad. Whilst mesmer (for example) will always be balanced to be the best.

The conceptual issues with necro will never be addressed and necro will never be good for an extended period for these reasons.

Brujeria.5693:

I think most of the problems necromancer currently is suffering from are major, high level design flaws. Sure you can analyze every change they do, and show them why these where bad / wrong / unwanted, but i think the problems lies in the concept. If you look at what the necromancer should be at a high level concept you see:

• A sturdy, attrition based class, deeply connected to aggressive gameplay. Conditions should be a connecting theme, as well as boon corrupt, condi manipulation and lifedrain. The necromancer should have excellent abilities to stick to a foe but limited disengage potential.

What ANet has created however is a sitting duck. Necromancers are first to focus in competetive game modes. Shroud in its design seems like a pure punishment – the skills feel clumsy, are unreliable and have long cast times and cooldowns – the ability to get lifeforce is heavily crippled by weapon choice – shroud as a profession mechanic has much more traits to make it good than other classes. Overall shroud feels very very limited compared to the other classes mechanics. Baseline skills, weapons, anc mechanics should be usefull and good by default. With traits and a concrete build in mind they should be awesome.

Now i could get into detail of all the following, conceptual problems but everyone should be able to see the problems without explanation.

• No stunbreaks, stability or potent defensive tools to maintain pressure.
• Very limited ways to generate Lifeforce
• Shroud is clumsy, the skills are all not up to the state of the game in regards of quickness and velocity.
• Shroud is limiting several traits, utility skills and builds.
• Fear is too weak. We have one single weapon skill, one single utility skill and one single shroud skill. Yet multiple traits are balanced around fear. Fear basedurations are too low. Fear has much more counters than any other CC skill in the game. Fear should either be a condition (stability and stun breaks have no effect) or a stun (condition cleans, resistance, reduced condi duration have no effect)
• Traits are a mess. See death magic for example, we have 4 traits that are based around minions. We lack % modifiers. We lack offensive group support. We lack a theme in most of the trait lines.
• Staff as a weapon is too weak and gated behind absurdly long cooldowns.

To put things into perspective here: can a necromancer, building around a theme be as efficient as other classes?

Can a pure glass cannon power necro be as strong as a thief, or warrior, or even mesmer in the same setup? It cant, it lacks the tools and the damage.

Can a pure tank necro be as sturdy as a pure tank warrior, or guard, or ele? No, it lacks the stability and stunbreaks to keep up its use. It doenst provide meaningful support, or meaningful CC like other builds.

Can a pure condi necro put out the same amount of pressure and damage as similar classes do? No, necros are good at corrupting and condition manipulation, but they are bad at inflicting much conditions themself. This turns them to maybe even under best circumstances. But these circumstances are only based on the enemy.

Solutions in my opinion would be:

• A full Baseline Shroud overhaul. Skills should be altered based on the weapons wielded.

• Lifeforce generation should be added in form of %damage done, in addition to the current skills generating lifeforce.

• A full rework of staff.

• A full rework of shroud interactions with skills and utilities.

• A full rework of minions.

• A full rework of traits.

All these reworks, with a high concept in mind would fix most of the problems. At this point we need major work, at a core design level. They are fixing things around a concept that has gotten out of place, so no matter how good or bad a small trait or skill change is, this is destined to fail.

I have been saying this for years ^

The problem with necro isn’t one of balance, at least from a pvp perspective.

The problem lies in the conceptual design of the class. In the current power creeped world where everyone is invulnerable all the time and where everyone hits like a truck with low cool-downs then you can’t just exist with a second (unreliable) health bar.

The weapons on necro are across the board weak. Everyone uses staff on every build as necro lacks condi clear so need staff 4. But this weapon is one of the worst in the entire game. The auto attack is useless and the cds and cast times are so long.

You can do all the tweaking you like, but the core issue is no damage avoidance. No invulns, no evades….that is the key to pvp in gw2. It will never change, so as power creep continues the necro will get worse. As power creep continues then slow cast attacks and no damage avoidance gets to be more of an issue.

Necro needs an entire rework from top to bottom to be anything other than cannon fodder in pvp.

Imagine having shadowstep as a utility on necro for example. Or imagine having blurred frenzy on a weapon set. It shows you how bad necro is.

flow.6043:

Tiresias.6473:

You have confused “feedback” with “negativity”.

Nobody is here making unsubstantiated claims. All the people running Reaper Shroud builds were legitimately surprised by the heavy-handed nerfs the spec received.

All the buffs you mentioned doesn’t really apply to this one spec. Compensation isn’t compensation if it doesn’t counterweight the negative changes.

I’ve already argued why those “negative changes” are really buffs.
Maybe you should link that build because I have no idea in what context those nerfs could be perceived as anywhere near heavy-handed.

Lordrosicky.5813:

How can you run unholy santurary without VP?

Exactly like before the patch. You don’t.

Yeh but I want to run my troll build if I come back to this game….

The change now figures to be a buff by a lot to necros as making a trait baseline across the whole class is a huge difference maker. But it was a necessary change to make it baseline.

Makes it significantly worse. I would guess this is a bug though.

Zefrost.3425:

Yeah flow I’m sure you also know as you’ve been here a while but not even exaggerating… 90% of necros don’t actually know how to play the class (including the devs unfortunately…)

I practically never used that trait and could give less of a kitten about it. I’ve never even really used soul reaping much after like 2014 as I find the whole line to be lacklustre. Any time I have ran soul reaping I never even noticed vital persistence. In WvW/PvP that trait was never needed in any scenario.

But hey… every build that I ever used just got a massive buff LOL

My gripe is the lack of meaningful changes to traitlines and greatsword/reaper lacking. Axe is actually a good power weapon nowadays, but you can’t go power necro because you need power/precision/ferocity and then you die instantly because you are a necro. And condi is better in every way.

Yeh we are all so clueless except you Zefrost. The god of gw2

This is a game, get over it. People have different views on stuff.

Flow: yes some buffs but it is balance relative to other classes. In addition a ton of the traits dependent on VP and speed of shadows got nerfed indirectly. You ignored the synergy aspects of the changes. Those are the most critical but hardest to see. How can you run unholy santurary without VP? Or shrouded removal?

It should have been made 33% or 50%. 25% is still too low so this change still hurts a lot when they didnt buff all the other traits that depended on VP

They took away $100 from us and then gave us back $50 and acted like it was a great thing to do.

Well its significantly better now, could be really nice with the signet trait and signet of undeath.

Ziggityzog.7389:

Mmmm too much qqing going on. Power necro for about a year n a half now. I’ve never had a issue with power necro and getting to gold t3 or plat each season without really trying since i hate conquest and how it’s boring. If i tried and did the required games, I would have gotten top 250 ez. Last 5 patches now have either boosted a bit or done nothing to my build.

Always remember like in gw1 unique builds win the game if you know how to use them right. No one expects builds that aren’t “meta” so they are caught off guard a bit. Yes Copy Paste “meta” builds seem fun till people know the easy counters or anet buffs them down for being over used. Then your stuck in the wind. I’ve head nothing but necros hating the patch but i laugh because it improved my build a tad and gave me more power build options to try. It just screwed the condi necros a bit lol. Just wish they buffed me a bit more

Power Reap 4 life.

“unique builds” lol dude this game has zero theory crafting scope. The game is so streamlined that even a 5 year old knows what the best spec is 2 seconds after they see the patch notes. There is no “non meta spec”. In fact there is no meta. A meta suggests play and counter play which does not exist in gw2. Gw2 is about spamming and using a ton of powerful stuff. It is irrelevant what your opponents bring to the table.

Flumek.9043:

flesh worm and spectral walk are ancient relics, theyre trash now.

worm = 1200 distance + criple/chill
…. in past that meant something, now even guards can gap close and everybody has cleanses to beat reaper level chills, base is just freekill

specral walk = 0 distance + swiftness + potential port over ledge or cca 900 distance (IF YOU CAN MOVE)
…again like above, everything is so powercreeped that pure kiting with distance doesnt exist anymore. also walk desperately needs superspeed atm to not move 0 distance and then port back

All wurm does is teleport away from your team mates (who can res or heal you) to die. Seen as when you teleport somewhere, like you say, every guardian/mesmer/thief/rev will be back on you within about 1 second with their unlimited gap closers

Dadnir.5038:

Lordrosicky.5813:

Why is the signet trait “must have”. For pvp it is likely complete garbage. Totally unviable. I havent tested it but I am almost certain I am right.

It basically shift what you lost from VP to the signets passive effect. If you depended from VP, the loss are compensated throught the passive of the signets and to have it in shroud you need the goddarn trait.

The trait is bad in pvp. To make the trait work you have to take bad utilities which makes the trait bad. GW2 is so power creeped that for a spec to work everything must be good. Traits, skills, weapons. Otherwise there is no point. Even if this trait is good (its not btw), but even if it were there is a huge opportunity cost to equipping terrible signets.

Not to mention its a huge risk doubling the effect of plague signet.

You have signet of locust on yoru bar and a thief has shadowstep. Who is better off? You have to take the good utilites.

Dadnir.5038:

Lordrosicky.5813:

Dadnir.5038:

Well, the vital persistence nerf had to be done. The reduced decay effect was way to overwhelming to leave any room for other traits.

And, Lordrosiky, sure all these traits are undirectly nerfed by this change but all build that didn’t use VP have been made competitive at the same time. The only thing that is scarry is that they shifted the reliance on VP to a reliance on the signet trait. An unsightly move if I can say…

Yes but traits that depended on VP for viability such as shrouded removal and unholy santuary should have been buffed when this trait was nerfed. And if they didnt do it now then they will never do it.

The traits listed are at the level of strength which makes them kind of ok when coupled with VP. Now VP no longer exists these traits are just bad. They were balanced around VP existing previously

The problem is these traits will take at least 3-4 years to be buffed to the point of being usable. Shrouded removal will not be usuable until this game dies most likely. Such is the speed they balance at.

If you instantly make 10-15 traits totally useless then this damages build diversity a lot.

I don’t disagree with you, but still VP reduced decay has to go. The trait was an issue, not a negative issue but a positive issue. The other traits have been weakened indirectly but it is not that bad. The “on shroud skill 1” traits won’t really lose any real efficiency while the “while in shroud” traits might be relient on the signet trait and signet of undeath (well… yeah, saying it feel like having poop in my mouth)

Like I said the real worry come from the signet trait. I don’t get what the hell happen in the dev minds for them to thoughtlessly transform this trait into a “must have in any build” trait. Wanna keep moving freely while in shroud? must take the signet trait and locust signet! Wanna reduce partially my life force decay? must take signet of undeath and signet trait or signet trait, unholy martyr and plague signet! Wanna have some easy regen in shroud? better take signet of vampirism and the signet’s trait!

This is the stupidest thing that they could do to the necromancer. Well… in my eyes their “rework” of the lich form is at the same level of stupidity thought.

Why is the signet trait “must have”. For pvp it is likely complete garbage. Totally unviable. I havent tested it but I am almost certain I am right.

Flumek.9043:

- make it baseline
- make it baseline weaker version, 3%
- increase all our LF abilities by 50%
- decrease all enemy abilities by 50%

So whats your choice and future vision arenanet?

“Swap necro or kick”

Most likely in about 9 months they will make it baseline but it will be like 15% slower (not 50%), so still complete garbage

This is why I quit the game 2 years ago After a while you have to accept that they are just bad at developing this game and quit. It makes for a happier existence.

But you get 3% death shroud per 3 seconds in death shroud when you equip signet of undeath /s

Also pulling 2 condis to yourself in death shroud when death shroud has zero condi removal means this trait is actully just bad with plague signet. Locust it is bad with too. And spite is 270 power. So yeh, bad all around except the heal I guess but that has an icd so it is bad too. Getting spiked for 7k by a thief and heal for 500 = no.

All in all that trait is now complete trash

The speed of shadows trait also nerfed the following traits by extension by making them less able to be proc-ed as often (as no ds cd reduction anymore):

Spiteful spirit
Weakening shroud
Shrouded removal
Life from death
Foot in the grave

So all these traits are now much worse as they cannot be combined with speed of shadows.

The speed of shadows trait also nerfed the following traits by extension by making them less able to be proc-ed as often (as no ds cd reduction anymore):

Spiteful spirit
Weakening shroud
Shrouded removal
Life from death
Foot in the grave

So all these traits are now much worse as they cannot be combined with speed of shadows.

So 20 necro traits got nerfed this patch as they nerfed the two main enabling traits on the necromancer which make all these other traits viable. Almost none of these other traits are viable without VP or speed of shadows.

20 necro traits nerfed in a single patch, most now totally unviable

gg

So this trait nerfed all enter/exit traits by proxy. VP nerfed all in death shroud traits by proxy.

I would say this patch made about 20 traits on necro way worse this patch. 20 nerfed traits in a single patch. Hilarious. They nerfed the enabler traits that enabled the other traits to not be useless.

I see a lot of people hoping this will be reverted. Sorry to pee on your collective bonfires but that isn’t going to happen. You will be stuck with this situation for at least 2 years

Brokensunday.4098:

Lordrosicky.5813:

SPESHAL.9106:

Lordrosicky.5813:

I have played since about a year after release and yeh this is the biggest nerf I have ever seen any class encounter, I dont think it is close. It is a comprehensive nerf to the entire class and the only build unaffected is a glass condi spec which you can still do well with. It is impossible to spec anything else now

I’ve played since day one. It’s not the nerf itself that’s the problem. They nerfed dhuumfire into extinction, but eventually came up with other things to compensate.

The REAL problem is that this many years after release they STILL don’t understand the importance of this trait…WHY it was in virtually every build…. and basically FORCED everyone to have Soul Reaping. When you read their exact words and logic, THAT’S what’s scary.

The reliance on VP was horrible design and should have been changed. You can’t have one trait that REQUIRED and impacted so many builds/traits/etc. However, what they did in this supposed “comprehensive” revision to fix the issue is beyond mindboggling.

You know what’s even scarier though is the design of Scourge. If any class can’t 100-0 a Scourge, it will be embarrassing based on what they’ve showed us thus far. There is no gap closer, no stability, and no chill…You are a cloth wearing support class that has to get in melee range of your enemy or super close to a shade for any benefit of the specialization. There are no scaling defenses (i.e immunity, block, etc) and anybody can just cc chain or kill you from range 100-0.

It’s basically a cloth wearing, banner, healing signet warrior with far less movement skills, blocks or immunities. And probably less healing and group utility too considering how small the radius of a shade is.

Yeh scourge is conceptually just awful. It will be farmed so easily by thieves. Going to be funny to watch how fast scourges die

this really makes me sad and show to us that they have cool ideas but at the time to make them to work they fail to comprehend their own game design and simply toss it really I feel like the necromancer is the experimental class, might re roll to any other class… makes me sad because I started playing on beta as a necro and now is just unplayable

Its going to be pretty funny trying to watch necros heal at all during a pvp game when all their heals have a 1.25 second cast. Without death shroud they wont be able to tank out in death shroud in between heal interupts either. Going to be funny to watch scourges play entire pvp games and not get a single heal off

Ramoth.9064:

Zoltreez.6435:

Ramoth.9064:

Zoltreez.6435:

Ramoth.9064:

Yeah sure, there’s barely a silver lining to VP getting nerfed, but even without it, at over 50%, its enough to pull off an RS4, RS5 and a couple auto chains of RS1 for good measure.

I’m talking PvP of course. You can still sponge burst attacks with shroud, even more than before if you pick up the new VP.

Its really not the end of the world.

Unless you are camping shroud of course, in which case LOL.

im 100% sure your not playing anykind of working Power build thats for freaking sure…
your those condi meta boys am i right ?

as a Power Reaper ALLOT of our dmg is in the form… ALLOT…

Ok, then I’m sure you’re setting because I’ve been playing power the last two seasons.

pocket ele ?

No. And if you’re not contributing to the conversion I’ll refrain from replying to you. I’m happy for anyone to disagree with me, but personally I don’t think this is the end of Necro

There can still be specs which exist that dont sit in death shroud. Of course there can. A proc based spec on condi necro will be really strong still for example. The point is one of build diversity and varied play styles. There is now many less ways to build a necro. Fringe builds which were kind of bad are now worthless. Power necro based around death shroud is also now really nerfed.

Dadnir.5038:

Well, the vital persistence nerf had to be done. The reduced decay effect was way to overwhelming to leave any room for other traits.

And, Lordrosiky, sure all these traits are undirectly nerfed by this change but all build that didn’t use VP have been made competitive at the same time. The only thing that is scarry is that they shifted the reliance on VP to a reliance on the signet trait. An unsightly move if I can say…

Yes but traits that depended on VP for viability such as shrouded removal and unholy santuary should have been buffed when this trait was nerfed. And if they didnt do it now then they will never do it.

The traits listed are at the level of strength which makes them kind of ok when coupled with VP. Now VP no longer exists these traits are just bad. They were balanced around VP existing previously

The problem is these traits will take at least 3-4 years to be buffed to the point of being usable. Shrouded removal will not be usuable until this game dies most likely. Such is the speed they balance at.

If you instantly make 10-15 traits totally useless then this damages build diversity a lot.

Ramoth.9064:

Lordrosicky.5813:

Ramoth.9064:

Lordrosicky.5813:

Ramoth.9064:

Lordrosicky.5813:

Ramoth.9064:

Serenity.6135:

Ramoth.9064:

Serenity.6135:

Here is a list posted by another player:

Lordrosicky.5813:

They nerfed the following traits by up to 50% indirectly:

Repears might
Rending shroud
Signets of suffering
Armored shroud
Shrouded removal
Deadly Strength
Unholy Sanctuary
Unholy Martyr
Unyielding blast
Death perception
Dhuumfire
Relentless Pursuit
Blighters boon

add speed of shadows

That isn’t entirely correct. For instance, you don’t need 50 seconds of shroud to get 25 might with reapers might, you only need just under 20, talking reaper btw. Which would still be an impractical thing to do.

???

You can still use reapers might to its full affect without VP. It takes a reaper less than 20 seconds to do 25 autoattcks in RS.

The point is you are running a spec where you want to spam 1 in RS then you are staying in DS for longer than a few seconds. The longer you stay in RS the more shroud you lose with this change. So the trait is nerfed by making it less desirable to now stay in death shroud for any extended period of times. Thus all the traits which mean make use of death shroud for more than a few seconds are worse because to utilise those traits to their fullest potential you will then have less HP (via less RS)

Are we talking PvP here? Because I wouldn’t waste my shroud spamming RS1. You wouldn’t do that raiding either and if its general PVE well, tbh anything goes. And yes, VP does hurt a few things like blighters boon, sure. Its definitely not as expansive as that list you say.

In pvp yes there are many builds where you spend time in DS spamming 1

For a full 50 seconds? Mind you, the more damage you take, the less of a difference VP makes.

Why are you on about the full 50 seconds? This doesnt matter because death shroud is a resource. If you get to 25 stacks of might with 2k death shroud left that is way way way worse than getting to 25 stacks of might with 10k death shroud left (numbers are just for demonstrations, not accurate)

The old VP let’s you sit in shroud for 50 seconds… As opposed to 25. And the situations used to illustrate the 50vs25 are unrealistic.

In a realistic scenario, when you have damage to deal with, CC to use, it’s not likely you’ll see the full effect of the 25 second benefit.

You have twisted this conversation into something it isnt. The point made was that traits which synergise with vital persistence are now a lot worse. And there is a lot of traits which synergised with vital persistence so that is a lot of nerfed traits.

That is it. If you disagree or do not understand this then I dont think we are going to progress this conversation as we obviously fundamentally disagree.

This is different to other trait nerfs. For example the dhuumfire nerf was considerable but only effected that single trait. This trait is the core of the necro profession for a lot of specs and many traits are not viable at all without using vital persistence too.

I am talking about pvp, I dont know about pve. I was the highest rated solo player on EU prior to HOT. I quit when HOT came out, returned for a few months during the solo queue and easily got to legend despite not having played for 2 years. I know this change is huge for pvp necros.

Ramoth.9064:

Lordrosicky.5813:

Ramoth.9064:

Lordrosicky.5813:

Ramoth.9064:

Serenity.6135:

Ramoth.9064:

Serenity.6135:

Here is a list posted by another player:

Lordrosicky.5813:

They nerfed the following traits by up to 50% indirectly:

Repears might
Rending shroud
Signets of suffering
Armored shroud
Shrouded removal
Deadly Strength
Unholy Sanctuary
Unholy Martyr
Unyielding blast
Death perception
Dhuumfire
Relentless Pursuit
Blighters boon

add speed of shadows

That isn’t entirely correct. For instance, you don’t need 50 seconds of shroud to get 25 might with reapers might, you only need just under 20, talking reaper btw. Which would still be an impractical thing to do.

???

You can still use reapers might to its full affect without VP. It takes a reaper less than 20 seconds to do 25 autoattcks in RS.

The point is you are running a spec where you want to spam 1 in RS then you are staying in DS for longer than a few seconds. The longer you stay in RS the more shroud you lose with this change. So the trait is nerfed by making it less desirable to now stay in death shroud for any extended period of times. Thus all the traits which mean make use of death shroud for more than a few seconds are worse because to utilise those traits to their fullest potential you will then have less HP (via less RS)

Are we talking PvP here? Because I wouldn’t waste my shroud spamming RS1. You wouldn’t do that raiding either and if its general PVE well, tbh anything goes. And yes, VP does hurt a few things like blighters boon, sure. Its definitely not as expansive as that list you say.

In pvp yes there are many builds where you spend time in DS spamming 1

For a full 50 seconds? Mind you, the more damage you take, the less of a difference VP makes.

Why are you on about the full 50 seconds? This doesnt matter because death shroud is a resource. If you get to 25 stacks of might with 2k death shroud left that is way way way worse than getting to 25 stacks of might with 10k death shroud left (numbers are just for demonstrations, not accurate)

Ramoth.9064:

Lordrosicky.5813:

Ramoth.9064:

Serenity.6135:

Ramoth.9064:

Serenity.6135:

Here is a list posted by another player:

Lordrosicky.5813:

They nerfed the following traits by up to 50% indirectly:

Repears might
Rending shroud
Signets of suffering
Armored shroud
Shrouded removal
Deadly Strength
Unholy Sanctuary
Unholy Martyr
Unyielding blast
Death perception
Dhuumfire
Relentless Pursuit
Blighters boon

add speed of shadows

That isn’t entirely correct. For instance, you don’t need 50 seconds of shroud to get 25 might with reapers might, you only need just under 20, talking reaper btw. Which would still be an impractical thing to do.

???

You can still use reapers might to its full affect without VP. It takes a reaper less than 20 seconds to do 25 autoattcks in RS.

The point is you are running a spec where you want to spam 1 in RS then you are staying in DS for longer than a few seconds. The longer you stay in RS the more shroud you lose with this change. So the trait is nerfed by making it less desirable to now stay in death shroud for any extended period of times. Thus all the traits which mean make use of death shroud for more than a few seconds are worse because to utilise those traits to their fullest potential you will then have less HP (via less RS)

Are we talking PvP here? Because I wouldn’t waste my shroud spamming RS1. You wouldn’t do that raiding either and if its general PVE well, tbh anything goes. And yes, VP does hurt a few things like blighters boon, sure. Its definitely not as expansive as that list you say.

In pvp yes there are many builds where you spend time in DS spamming 1

SPESHAL.9106:

Lordrosicky.5813:

I have played since about a year after release and yeh this is the biggest nerf I have ever seen any class encounter, I dont think it is close. It is a comprehensive nerf to the entire class and the only build unaffected is a glass condi spec which you can still do well with. It is impossible to spec anything else now

I’ve played since day one. It’s not the nerf itself that’s the problem. They nerfed dhuumfire into extinction, but eventually came up with other things to compensate.

The REAL problem is that this many years after release they STILL don’t understand the importance of this trait…WHY it was in virtually every build…. and basically FORCED everyone to have Soul Reaping. When you read their exact words and logic, THAT’S what’s scary.

The reliance on VP was horrible design and should have been changed. You can’t have one trait that REQUIRED and impacted so many builds/traits/etc. However, what they did in this supposed “comprehensive” revision to fix the issue is beyond mindboggling.

You know what’s even scarier though is the design of Scourge. If any class can’t 100-0 a Scourge, it will be embarrassing based on what they’ve showed us thus far. There is no gap closer, no stability, and no chill…You are a cloth wearing support class that has to get in melee range of your enemy or super close to a shade for any benefit of the specialization. There are no scaling defenses (i.e immunity, block, etc) and anybody can just cc chain or kill you from range 100-0.

It’s basically a cloth wearing, banner, healing signet warrior with far less movement skills, blocks or immunities. And probably less healing and group utility too considering how small the radius of a shade is.

Yeh scourge is conceptually just awful. It will be farmed so easily by thieves. Going to be funny to watch how fast scourges die

Ramoth.9064:

Serenity.6135:

Ramoth.9064:

Serenity.6135:

Here is a list posted by another player:

Lordrosicky.5813:

They nerfed the following traits by up to 50% indirectly:

Repears might
Rending shroud
Signets of suffering
Armored shroud
Shrouded removal
Deadly Strength
Unholy Sanctuary
Unholy Martyr
Unyielding blast
Death perception
Dhuumfire
Relentless Pursuit
Blighters boon

add speed of shadows

That isn’t entirely correct. For instance, you don’t need 50 seconds of shroud to get 25 might with reapers might, you only need just under 20, talking reaper btw. Which would still be an impractical thing to do.

???

You can still use reapers might to its full affect without VP. It takes a reaper less than 20 seconds to do 25 autoattcks in RS.

The point is you are running a spec where you want to spam 1 in RS then you are staying in DS for longer than a few seconds. The longer you stay in RS the more shroud you lose with this change. So the trait is nerfed by making it less desirable to now stay in death shroud for any extended period of times. Thus all the traits which mean make use of death shroud for more than a few seconds are worse because to utilise those traits to their fullest potential you will then have less HP (via less RS)

Brokensunday.4098:

the nerf is so big that you can quote me necro will not be playable in pvp tops gold with luck
they should have make it base making it 33%-40% instead of the 50 it was and like the other person say they nerf a bunch of other traits by doing this
good thing they make a trait to make signets work on shroud something that should have been in the game for years without a trait… primitively thinking …..

I have played since about a year after release and yeh this is the biggest nerf I have ever seen any class encounter, I dont think it is close. It is a comprehensive nerf to the entire class and the only build unaffected is a glass condi spec which you can still do well with. It is impossible to spec anything else now

Ramoth.9064:

Yeah sure, there’s barely a silver lining to VP getting nerfed, but even without it, at over 50%, its enough to pull off an RS4, RS5 and a couple auto chains of RS1 for good measure.

I’m talking PvP of course. You can still sponge burst attacks with shroud, even more than before if you pick up the new VP.

Its really not the end of the world.

Unless you are camping shroud of course, in which case LOL.

The thing is build diversity. Play a glass/proc based condi mancer and this changes isnt noticeable at all, partly because you probably dont even run this trait. However there are fringe sustain specs and many powerful power specs that do rely on significant time in DS and spamming ds1. It wouldnt be so much of an issue if the cds on necro skills werent so long.

It isnt the VP nerf alone, it is the fact 14 other traits got nerfed as a result of this change. Any class which sees 14 of their traits nerfed in a single patch is probably not going to be in a good spot.

They nerfed the following traits by up to 50% indirectly:

Repears might
Rending shroud
Signets of suffering
Armored shroud
Shrouded removal
Deadly Strength
Unholy Sanctuary
Unholy Martyr
Unyielding blast
Death perception
Dhuumfire
Relentless Pursuit
Blighters boon

All these traits are now worse. Most went from semi-bad to completely useless. Unholy martyr, unholy santuary, shrouded removal, etc.. these were only semi useful with vital persistence so now they are utterly worthless probably in all game modes.

So we got 14 traits nerfed, many into complete worthlessness.

Reposting this here in case my pvp post is removed

Zoltreez.6435:

Devs managed to nerf both in PvE and PvP a class that had issues in both…

They only nerfed the following traits by up to 50% indirectly:

Repears might
Rending shroud
Signets of suffering
Armored shroud
Shrouded removal
Deadly Strength
Unholy Sanctuary
Unholy Martyr
Unyielding blast
Death perception
Dhuumfire
Relentless Pursuit
Blighters boon

All these traits are now worse. Most went from semi-bad to completely useless. Unholy martyr, unholy santuary, shrouded removal, etc.. these were only semi useful with vital persistence so now they are utterly worthless probably in all game modes.

So we got 14 traits nerfed, many into complete worthlessness.

It is actually pretty funny

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Brokensunday.4098:

Lordrosicky.5813:

Yeh without vital persistence any power spec based around deathshroud is dead. You basically cannot spec for sustain now I would imagine. You could try going signets with undeath to give you death shroud regen but this wont work as you wont have any condi clear.

Vital persistence deletion basically makes about a dozen other necro traits unplayable such as unholy santuary and unholy martyr. Their only semi-usefullness existed from sitting in death shroud for longer. In addition, the new signet trait is way worse due to the deletion of vital persistence.

Anet didnt mean to nerf about 10 necros traits in a single pass but they did it nonetheless.

you only forgot the small detail that signets does not work on shroud >.< but basically they killed core necro and reaper from pvp

Signets do work in Shroud if you take Signets of Suffering now. No Might or boon corruption, though.

But them working in shroud is pointless because without vital persistence in pvp you wont ever have shroud. Hence this vital persistence nerf is actually a nerf to about 15 necro traits indirectly, and a big one.

Obviously those traits were not buffed to even retain close to the same usefullness because anet lack foresight.

Finally the devs did something good with this nerf. I love it. What is particularly awesome is that by nerfing this single trait you managed to delete basically every necro spec besides a glass condi spec from existence. This is AMAZING…omg its amazing I can hardly contain my excitement to try these other specs and see how fast I die on them with no death shroud ever…it will be like a really fun mini game to see how many headshots till we all die.

I love the fact that by changing this trait you managed to nerf all the other death shroud traits such as unholy santuary and unholy martyr, and shrouded removal. These traits already sucked, so making then all 50% worse is really smart because it stops people from even thinking about taking them. Sure you might say it deletes all build diversity but build diversity sucks anyway, the game would be much more fun if everyone was a mesmer or a thief.

I also love the fact that none of these traits that are now worthless will be balanced for at least 3 years. We had the tri-yearly balance update so it is really important to now get to grips with the 1 spec that necros can play for the next 3 years. I am absolutely loving it. It is so much fun.

I am really impressed how deeply anet considered this change, my faith is restored. I love nerfing the key trait on the entire necro class, I think it is a really good idea.

Awesome work, keep it up! This expansion is going to be so good.

Yeh without vital persistence any power spec based around deathshroud is dead. You basically cannot spec for sustain now I would imagine. You could try going signets with undeath to give you death shroud regen but this wont work as you wont have any condi clear.

Vital persistence deletion basically makes about a dozen other necro traits unplayable such as unholy santuary and unholy martyr. Their only semi-usefullness existed from sitting in death shroud for longer. In addition, the new signet trait is way worse due to the deletion of vital persistence.

Anet didnt mean to nerf about 10 necros traits in a single pass but they did it nonetheless.

Introduce all the amulets back but celestial should be nerfed to have the same number of stats as 4 stat amulets

lol that animation is hilarious. Whoever plays this game is going to damage their eyes so much

Silv.9207:

Scourge problems:
- no stability
-no defensive skills (unless a portal that we still have to see)
-no Combo Finisher (we lose the Leap and the Whirl from the Reaper to obtain nothing)
-no Stun (we lose the RS5 and the Elite of the reaper, then we have only the warhorn as a Cc different then Fear or Immobilize)
-no movement skills? (we lose the leap but obtain the Portal. To see it’s range, casting time and more in a real fight)
-worst Lf generation (compared to the Reaper the Scourge lose a lot of LF generation, also becoming chained to boon corruption)
-Worst meatshield defence (barriers are only another version of the Old meatshield strategy, nothing more. But you can’t use your full LF to survive, the barriers last for a fixed duration and have decacy, you can’t use the Spectral Armor/Walk trick or the unholy marthyr to generate LF while in shroud and you also lose the 50% direct damage reduction that you have while in Shroud)
-Highly chained to corrupt Boons to his Defensive and Offensive strategy, that will not work against a class that use few boons ro don’t use any (and there’s a large amount of builds that don’t rely on boons anymore, expecially because of necromancer corruption ability). Basicly, if the enemy don’t have boons you do Nothing.
-Chained to the area, can’t play freely moving all around because need to stay near his Shades to obtain a good effect, more or less as the old Turret engi, only a little mobile. That is seriously a Big problem for a class without any kind of defensive skill unless Spectral armor and a Portal (that also strip him away from his controlled area…)
-Mechanic damage output chained to Static Shades (that may grant a lot of damage in a static fight like a PvE boss but a really low damage in a common PvP fight. But for shure will be good in WvW zergs as a long range build using Shades and Punishment while in shorter range)
-weaker mechanic offensive “combo” than the Reaper (in sPvP with the RS4+RS5 and Deathly Chill a reaper can spam up to 25k of damage over 9 seconds, while in PvE and WvW the damage can grow up to 65k over 9 seconds. The Scourge inflict lesser than 19k of damage on a Moving target with Powered Torment and few Burn over 7 seconds -from the end of the execution-, using all his Fx skills -starting with all the 3 Shades- and using ALL the Fx skills, then also losing your defences to inflict damage.
-Weak Support, easy to ignore (expecially if compared to other classes and to what the necro was able to do also before, the Scourge don’t grant anything better than another class can do. No better might stack, no better condi clean, no AoE CC. the only thing that grant is a Barrier with a decacy that in PvP or sPvP will be totally Ignored because will stop maybe a single hit and not even it’s total damage if is a strong one)

That’s all the things i think about the possible problems of the Scourge, expecially if compared to the Reaper.

The Scourge is good, will grant more tactic and are control effects, a Little support and a good condition damage. But I dont’ think that the damage output will be so strong to justify a similar lack of any kind of barely decent defensive skill and the support granted is low and will be just ignored in a lot of situations.
that Elite (as it is now) will not grant us any new Role, any spot in raids, any victory in sPvP, any strong damage…
I can’t belive that ANet proposed us that elite…

On the paper there’s so much problems and lacks on this elite that there will be for shure problems while in play.

Maybe it will reveal to be strong and with few fixes the support and the damage will grow stronger and everyone will want a Scourge in team for support and/or damage. But if I look at it for how is right now… I will never want a similar class in my team.

The key is that it is still just a meat shield. For both pvp and pve where power creep is a thing it means that this meat shield because worse and worse relative to evasion.

Example:
- Lets say after this expansion a thief can do 30k dps in 10 seconds and previously they could do 28k dps in 10 seconds. That just makes the meat shield defense way worse, whereas an evade gets better because an evade will avoid more damage than before.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Ephemiel.5694:

I assume it’ll work similar to how Reaper’s Shroud works

It can’t, really. We don’t get new skills from using Desert Shroud (which is itself just a skill).

None of the F skills are without cooldown either, so the three traits affecting Shroud 1, they’re either going to be pathetic or something different is happening with them.

They will just be pathetic. That is how anet operates. Look at traits that have sucked for 4 years and nothing is done about them. Look at traits like unholy sanctuary which only gives regen level healing in death shroud (lol) and is never buffed

witcher.3197:

This, so much this. Remember when we had to bait stunbreakers before we used bigger CCs? Now everyone has a million ways to deal with anything and a million ways to apply stuff.

There are no more “big plays”, any strategical thinking was killed off with HoT. It’s just skill spam.

This is why the game failed. MOBA’s success is based on big plays and how cool they are to do and watch.. GW2 used to kind of have this but has moved in the other direction where it is just spam with no individual things really mattering at all

Khenzy.9348:

Lordrosicky.5813:

Khenzy.9348:

Fresh Air Ele is going to be pretty godly. With a grandmaster trait that removes condies every half a second when you have superspeed… such a thing removes the need to rely on water to remove condies. The Weaver also offers some interesting defensive skills, so you could potentially have a very well rounded Fresh Air ele, a vastly improved version of what you can have right now.

Ranger’s Soulbeast on the other hand… it seems very bland and their GM traits are utter trash.

Fresh air will be thief fodder still. Theory craft 95% of builds and the chances are thief will make them not viable on its own. You cant avoid thieves as they are fast so if your spec is bad vs thieves then you cant play it.

Doesnt matter what fresh air ele tries to do when they get 1 shot by thieves whilst being perma stunned

Indeed, pretty much. Yet, we still don’t know all of the dual skills or the Sword skills, there may be something there that might help them against thieves.

Also, Scourge doesn’t seem all that good at first glance to be honest. Poor mobility + no stability + no Shourd HP = …
Will the new Barrier make up for it? We don’t know yet.

Scourge and a fresh air ele will not be viable due to thief and mesmer. It doesnt matter what skills are added to these classes, they are conceptually just bad for anything other than fringe roles.

Barrier could be amazing and it wont matter . Thieves and mesmers will be invulnerable so often you cant hit them. A thief can just dodge around when you pop barrier and let it run out naturally and then spike you 100-0 in about 1 second. Same with ele, it doesnt matter if the fresh air spec has some amazing cds for protection because a thief or mesmer will be invulnerable (evade) constantly and then just spike them when the cds run out with a bunch of stuns.

Khenzy.9348:

Fresh Air Ele is going to be pretty godly. With a grandmaster trait that removes condies every half a second when you have superspeed… such a thing removes the need to rely on water to remove condies. The Weaver also offers some interesting defensive skills, so you could potentially have a very well rounded Fresh Air ele, a vastly improved version of what you can have right now.

Ranger’s Soulbeast on the other hand… it seems very bland and their GM traits are utter trash.

Fresh air will be thief fodder still. Theory craft 95% of builds and the chances are thief will make them not viable on its own. You cant avoid thieves as they are fast so if your spec is bad vs thieves then you cant play it.

Doesnt matter what fresh air ele tries to do when they get 1 shot by thieves whilst being perma stunned

Ithilwen.1529:

I predict that there will be loud calls for Mesmer nerfs within hours of release. We’re likely to see some of the same kind of harsh dialing down that Chrono got.

That’s not because the spec will be OP. It’s because it might be deceptive enough to fool some players.

Some months down the road, any new mechanic Mirage introduces may be shared with 1 or more other classes.

I’m actually pretty depressed about this even though I’m over the moon about returning to Elona.

Mesmer has been the best class since HOT came out and it still is. That was some sure “harsh dialing down”. lol its like you people dont live in the real world

Odds this expansion delivers huge power creep: 100%.

MethaneGas.8357:

Hello fellow Necros!

So…. today we have had a glimpse at Scourge. In short… it has no shroud, but it does have 5 F-skills, and the essential one if F1 which summons… ghosts called “shades” that combo off-of the other shroud skills. These skills are basically new shroud skills that you can use all the time by expending the life-force you generate.

I also love the dynamic Scourge adds to Necro – your shroud skills are affecting areas around you, but your shades as well… so essentially it makes Necros very versatile. You can kite your enemies and set up your shades in the enemy’s path, then use a shroud skill to affect the enemy without even having to face them… as they’re chasing. You can also target enemies which are in 900 range from you, and gives you realllyyy good area control because no one’s gonna wanna be around your shades. Barrier also seems like a very cool way to make up for lack of shroud, and also add a really nice and unique layer of support too. Anyway, I think this spec has a LOT of potential and #stoked

Personally though, I’m really interested in seeing how these traits below will work with the new shroud and how these synergies will play out. For example:

1) Transfusion – Shroud #4 heals allies around you. You don’t get heals because you’re in shroud… but… with sand shroud you’re always in normal form. So I’m guessing this skill will work off-of skill #5. Summon a field that lasts lasts 6s, pulses 7 times and does damage around you and shades (20 sec cooldown). I’m guessing this is where the healing will happen and you will be able to get these heals from transfusion. It pulses 7 times over 6 secs, so not a burst heal, but a nice heal nevertheless for you as a Necro :P …every 14 secs basically.. because it lasts 6 secs. Hopefully this will be the way it works.
2) Dhuumfire – shroud #1 burns enemies. So will this give your shades the ability to burn on their auto attacks? Or will this just cause AoE burns in the area where you summon shades? Either way, it’s an interesting combo for potential Burn Necro: torch and trait which burns targets that you apply torment to? Lots of burning
3) Path of Corruption. Sand shroud #2 converts 2 condi on allies to boons around you, and around your shades (same target cannot be affected twice by this). 5 ssec cooldown. Path of Corruption synergy with this could basically be a huggee. Your shades cover basically the whole battle and this could corrupt 2 boons in a very large area… every 5 secs O_O …. Yes please.
4) Vital Persistence – Maybe shroud skills cost less to cast? Reduced cooldown? Oh my… the synergy with the above traits.
5) Death’s Perception – do your shroud skills naturally have 50% crit chance, including your shades?

Honourable mentions: Weakening Shroud, Rending Shroud, Spiteful Spirit, Shrouded Removal, Beyond the Veil (protection when leaving shroud, minor trait in Death Magic), Unholy Sanctuary, Life From Death (heal allies and revive them a lil bit when exiting shroud), Unholy Martyr, Unyielding Blast, Foot in the Grave. And ofc there’s a few minors here and there…

All of the above traits have the potential to somehow interact with the new shroud. We will just have to wait and see how.

Last thing! I think I saw the Necro teleport in one of the videos… and this may be a Utility skill which we haven’t yet seen (hopefully). So Scourge will potentially have a teleport. Wurm, new teleport = nice mobility. Add in Spectral Walk and the jukes are real

More than likely they will nerf transfusion and the result will be it is kitten for all necro specs. In fact any of these traits that are too strong with scourge will just get the nerf bat without consideration for necro and repear. This is how anet does things. There is zero chance they were smart enough to design balanced concepts