Guild Wars 2

ZudetGambeous.9573:

I think the best solution is actually what you mentioned, let chill apply a different condition on each chill application. Either burn, poison, or torment come to mind as good candidates.

This won’t ever happen because it would make each Fear we land cause Fear, Chill, 3 Vuln+X effectively turning each Fear into a condi bomb. Which would mean that loading up on both Terror and Deathly Chill suddenly front loads opponents with 3 different damaging conditions with one skill, and with the changes to vuln, every chill you’re landing is also increasing the damage those Condi’s are doing. It’s a recipe to get us Dumbfire nerfed all over again.

Can’t comment on Cele Mesmer, as I suck with on Mesmer no matter the build. That being said, Cele Signet Necro, while strong, is still not anywhere near the levels of faceroll that is Cele D/D ele.

Damage/Might Stacking: Decent if the Necro can drop you below 50% health.

Condi: Average. The majority of the builds condi damage ironically comes from other classes, particularly if you load up the Necro with burn. This is also because the transferred condi’s use their original sources Condi Damage stat. The condi pressure from boon conversion is mediocre at best, but still decent enough pressure that I’d rank it as average since the build doesn’t have reliable access to Burn like other Cele builds (RNG from boon converting and transferring back to opponents is not a reliable access to the condition).

Sustain: Excellent in 1v1’s. Terrible in any kind of a team fight. This has been more or less a Necro thing even before the Cele Signet Build. Necros with life force are tough cookies to crack in most 1v1 situation, however with no scaling defense they are highly susceptible to any kind of focus fire in team fights. Focus down the necro first is still a good strategy for a reason people.

Mobility: Non-existent. This can be bumped up a little by swapping Spectral Armour with Flesh Wurm, but most still prefer Spectral Armour due to how hit or miss the port on Flesh Wurm can be on some maps. Even with this, the Necros ability to disengage or flee engagements has and likely always will be the worst in game. Couple this with the lack of sustain in team fights mentioned above, and you have a class that doesn’t manage focus fire or have the ability to disengage from it and Necro drops like a rock.

CC/Stability/Stunbreaks: Access to a number of fears, and potential for more fears from converting stab is actually pretty good overall depending on the situation. However the access to fear from boon converting drops significantly the more boons on the target (ie Any class that can spam enough boons to make RNG work in their favour). Necros access to Stab remains almost non-existent. Taking Foot in the Grave to improve CC management is viable, but results in a hefty blow to DPS because it means giving up on Death Perception. This means that Necros absolutely need two stun-break utilities (in this case Plague Sig and Spectral Armour), and once those cool downs are blown they’re more or less sitting ducks to CC chains.

Now, after all of that, will I say Cele Signet Necro is good? Yes, it’s a solid build that is probably one of the best builds for 1v1 at the moment you can find. However it still has the same weaknesses that every Necro build has. Susceptibility to chain CC and no scaling defense to effectively deal with bursts besides just eating it in the face if we’re out of dodges. The build just doesn’t hold up a candle though to what Cele D/D Eles bring to the table.

Lily.1935:

Its not the Necromancer community’s responsibility to create a podcast for every other profession and discuss them in major detail. Its their respected communities that need to do that.

Less of an issue about it being our responsibility to do it in that format, and more of an issue that only having a Dev available to talk about Necro will cause a kitten storm the likes of which these forums have never seen before as people start demanding Devs do something with each individual class.

So what was intended as a one off for one profession suddenly turns into 7 additional podcasts. It’s a scheduling nightmare at that point, and I’m not surprised that they wanted to avoid it. Not saying I’m happy they didn’t do it, but I can honestly understand why there’d be pressure to do one podcast featuring all the professions.

TheLastNobody.8319:

Skoigoth.9238:

I think keeping it in Soul Reaping is fine, it just needs to not suck so much. My suggestion would be to just copy-paste Incendiary Powder (Engi GM: 4sec Burn on Crit, 33% longer Burn duration) and see how it works out.

That’s what dhuumfire originally was I think…only, can’t remeber if it had the ICD or not. Think it did.

It pretty much was the Incendiary Powder copy and pasted. It was also at the height of our condi application, so at the time it gave Necromancers easy access to every damaging condition in the game minus Confusion, as well as the ability to have Fear deal damage. There were simply too many threats for anybody to cleanse effectively or readily.

I think it was also at the time that Warriors had some of the worst condi-cleanses in the game, so they were pretty frustrated over having no real means of dealing with a condi class of any kind and then comes in a Necromancer and face rolls them.

Oh how the times have changed…

Anchoku.8142:

Not everything can be fixed or changed right away. Consider how long it took to fix downed state, the Dhuumfire saga, or the great changes to Blood Magic.

Except it didn’t take them all that long to nerf our condi application after Dumbfire, and our condi application has been going downhill since. If anything, it feels like they’re gearing the entirety of Condi application towards boon corruption, which is entirely RNG now making it an RNG mini-game whenever we want to apply condi pressure. The fact of the matter is, they are often very quick to nerf us, and very slow to buff us. If anything, they likely refer to the Dumbfire patch whenever they think about giving the Necromancer community what it wants (btw, the Necro community did want Burning, and I’m sure if you have the patience to look for those old threads you can find the proof), they are forever hesitant to consent for all the qq that Dumbfire spawned in its time.

Skoigoth.9238:

Maybe in beta idk, I started playing at release so I can´t say much about that.

It was in Beta that Necromancers were monsters. While I didn’t play in the earlier closed betas, you can still see just what most people are talking about by looking at some of our old traits from back then. In particular Shade which is basically Foot in the Grave on steroids. Necromancers have since then, always been balanced on the perspective of “they were terrifying once, we need to avoid them becoming unstoppable again”.

Except CC’s self-inflicted blind never inflicted chill (and subsequently more vuln) even when traited with Bitter Chill and Chilling Darkness. I remember testing this after the patch went live on the 23rd.

Cogbyrn.7283:

Ratphink.4751:

Heaven forbid our Elite actually be worthy of the slot.

This is actually my favorite argument against the nerf so far. Why exactly can’t Plague Form be strong, instead of “situationally OK, sort of”?

Just wait, I’m going to call it now, since the Reaper has even more access to Chill than core we’re going to see Bitter Chill get nerfed to 1 stack of vuln on a five second ICD soon after the Expansion hits because people will cry about fear inflicting chill and vuln.

EDIT: Edit due to excessive additions of kittens due to weird censoring algorithm

Heaven forbid our Elite actually be worthy of the slot.

Can we all just agree that this trait got hit by Isaiah’s Balance?

The only conceivable reason I can concoct for this madness is that some dev thought that Chilling Darkness and Bitter Chill made Necros Vuln stacking “OP”. Were people even doing this in PvP? Was this even a thing?

Oh well. We still have Plague Sending at least (at least until they nerf that into oblivion too).

The tool tips seemed to suggest what Spoj said though. If I remember the correctly, it’s only the last attack on the chain that references traits effecting Life Blast. Source

I feel like Your Soul is Mine is going to suffer the most because of the shout trait and how they view Death Shroud as essentially a second health bar. Taking a closer look at the numbers, at maximum Potential it gives you an ‘on paper’ 8k “health” (4k hp+4k DS) that can potentially be spammed every 13 seconds. This putting it as the shortest cooldown of any currently known Heal Skill in the game. It also means that they’re viewing the value of Lifeforce as effective health (hence why the heal is so low).

However our base health being so high, means that this is effectively a band-aid, or literally just needs to be spammed whenever it’s off cool down to provide constant healing even if it means using it outside of big team fights (In other words, using it even when it’s NOT getting the most bang for its buck). But the fact that it’s such a low value heal with a 3/4 cast time means that it’s very likely going to get interrupted making its value as a healing skill all the less valuable.

Not sure what they can do besides tweak the base heal up and maybe lower the cast time, but I have a distinct feeling that they’re not going to for the reasons I mentioned above.

Minions are just utilities, so yes. You can use your utility slots for Minion Skills. Nothing says you have to take the Reaper Shouts when you spec into the Reaper.

No mention has been made on Minion AI and its pathing issues.

Donari.5237:

I’m trying to figure out the armor pieces from the video. It’s hard with dull dark colors on a dark though burning background. But it does seem likely they’ll put the Grenth hood back in the gem store …

The head piece appears to be the new armor skin you unlock with the Reaper. From what I’ve seen over on Massively, shoulders, gloves, chest, and legs are all Arah Dungeon armor. Can’t get a clear enough look at the boots to figure out if they’re the last piece in the set though.

I feel like I am slowly understanding their trait changes.

Going Spite/Curses/Reaper could be a possible build, though it’s viability remains to be seen.

Bitter Chill/Chill of Death/Close to Death
Chilling Darkness/Path of Corruption/Terror

Then we’ll have Shivers of Dread and Cold Shoulder in the Minor tree. While Terror’s damage will likely be lack luster, it’ll be addition DPS on top of everything else. However I still remain skeptical of whether or not it would be worth dropping Death Perception for. :/

Without having seen the rest of the traits or the skills that Reaper brings, my current problem is that they are giving us a class that is supposed to be in the thick of things, with slow cast times, and still no viable sustain. Essentially they’re trying to push Necros out of the backline without any real means of supporting ourselves.

Unless this Elite spec actually brings some active damage mitigation besides Deathshroud, our position in all game formats likely won’t change. If anything, the problems we suffer from will be all the more exasperated by these changes as we’re given ‘cool stuff’ but no real means of using it without getting stunlocked and focused down into an early grave.

However, we have seen less than a handful of traits and one shout. So I’m hoping that the PoI addresses some of these concerns… however I somehow doubt that it will.

But we’re super awesome in the GWEN meta, asking for more is just being greedy. /s

No. An artistic splash of dark green is shown in the background in the same manner that blue is splashed in the background for the Dragonhunter and purple is splashed in the background of the Mesmer. Let’s all remember that Anet loves doing that for artistic flare. Hell… this exact same circumstance happened with the previous art for the Necromancer, and there was an entire thread on this forum raging about those gholish hands grasping around the Necro and the final product has nothing that does that kind of ability.

@Jelzouki: My point was that what soft cc we’re given, and what pulls and teleports we have to try and lock opponents down so badly implemented they don’t work. There’s a reason that nobody uses Spectral Grasp, a skill that should be one of our best means of making sure people don’t escape: the projectile is so slow that just having swiftness ensures it never lands when you’re target is trying to escape.

Having access to pulls, immobs, and means of ensuring that others can’t just spam their leaps teleports and swiftness to get away from us is what I think we need (but that’s just my opinion and I’ll be the first to admit I’m not any form of expert on the necro). But having the skills I mentioned above is also redundant if they simply can’t land, and that’s an issue with our cast times and projectile speeds as well. The class is so clunky that an arthritic grandmother can dodge most of our skills (I’m looking at your Dark Pact) which just exasperates our already pathetic ability to hold people down in place.

The Skill Icon for the Mursaat’s Spectral Agony was the skill icon used for the majority of Enemy Unique skills in the game.

And as others have mentioned, the Mursaat are a Race (one of the races that existed during the previous rise of the Elder Dragons). They were spellcasters and you could encounter bosses that were Elementalists, Mesmers, Necromancers, and Monks when you encountered them in GW1.

People keep saying we need Mobility, and while I understand the sentiment I’d much rather Anet revisit their idea that Necros should be harder to escape from, if not one of the hardest classes to escape from. Increasing the speed of Dark Path would be a huge help in this, and I think that was also their mentality when they started talking about Chill in the Trait overhaul preview. Unfortunately though, due to stupid long cast times and stupid slow projectiles we simply can’t do that.

Also I’d much rather see us gain more ability to hold our ground. If we’re meant to be a low mobility class with stupid health give us the ability to hold our ground. At the very least we need more access to stability, otherwise our healthpool is utterly meaningless if we’re just stun locked and taking an absolute thrashing. So I say less focus on mobility, more focus on our ability to lock a target down (immobs, chills, and cripples) and the ability to mitigate damage better than just taking it when we’re stunlocked and have no other course of action.

The trait will also be changing sometime between now and release of HoT to proc might when hitting an enemy below… I want to say 50% hp but I could be wrong.

And as Foefaller stated, the original concept to the trait was to maximize it’s usage in Death Shroud. Without the internal cooldown this meant you could gain stacks of might of every hit you received below 25% health (in or out of Death Shroud). Unfortunately this usually meant dying with large amounts of might by the time you were forced out of DS, hence the incoming change to it.

brannigan.9831:

The damage and stability together is ridiculous. Are you really telling me that in a game based on holding points what I should do is run away for half a minute? Necros are weakish in the current meta but that doesn’t justify this. Boost the class nerf the crap.

Possible Solutions:

Team co-ordinate a burst on the Lich as he has zero defenses. One of two things will occur:
1) The necro drops lich to try and stay alive and the damage is negated.
2) The lich is droped and the damage is negated.

Since the stability provided by Lich is 1 second every 3 seconds, it is very easy for multiple classes co-ordinating their CC to also stun lock the Lich also negating all of his damage. Remember, that Stability is not a stunbreak, even if it is reapplied he will still be CC’d until it wears off which gives you ample time to strip the new stability and repeat the process.

Use LoS to avoid the pew pew. You can do this on various maps will never fully disengaging the Lich. While the Lich will likely still be contending the point, the point remains that the while the necromancer was alive he was likely already going to be doing that. Since as mentioned above the Necromancer has no defenses, any form of damage pressure is going to be health he cannot regain while in Lich Form.

If the Necro just blew his 180 second cooldown to beat you in a 1v1, disengage go help your team in a team fight and return to murder the necro. Chances are if he had to use his elite to win the 1v1, now that’s on cool down for the next 3 minutes you should be able to kill him and recap the point before much damage is done.

Lastly Lich is not half a minute. It is 20 seconds. Kind of a nit pick at this point, but still pertinent, as it’s 1/3 of a minute.

I feel like everybody is getting worked up over something that was done with artistic license in mind…. and we all know how that HoT teaser trailer ended didn’t we? Sometimes guys, a spoon is just a spoon, and sometimes a splash of green in the background is just a splash of green.

This piece conveys everything the previous ones were supposed to convey. A new weapon (Shield, Longbow, Greatsword) new piece of armor (Shoulders, Gauntlets, Hood) and the profession in question (Mesmer, Guardian, Necromancer). I think everything after that is you guys digging for things that just aren’t there. o___o

This rhetoric is so tiresome. So because Necros excel in a Zerg vs Zerg format, which is literally a niche role in one of three game modes, we have to be held back? That’s like saying “Well Theifs are excellent roamers, so let’s limit their ability to do anything else in the game because they could potentially be even better at roaming if we do.”

The frustrating part is this is the logic I keep seeing with Necromancer. Because Necromancers are part of the GWEN meta, they are considered in a good spot, even when it is shown time and time again that it simply isn’t the case?

EDIT: For what it’s worth though, I also hate the fact that this actually got dredged up again. The whole ‘master deathshroud’ got tired and old two years ago, and it still stinks worse than your average dead horse.

Is it any wonder Devs hate talking about Necromancers? Everything they say goes on record for the community to spit back at their faces for literally years now? Good job. I won’t be surprised if PoI basically just say “This is the elite spec. This is its name. This is what the skills are. Bye.”

Baseless Speculations:

6 Eyed Greatsword means Abaddon. Going off of that, we know that Abaddon was the focal antagonist of the Nightfall campaign from GW1, which took part in Elona. Specifically we know the Six Gods chained Abaddon at the Mouth of Torment. The mouth is a huge pit in the Desolation. Oh look, the Necro in the art is wearing a hood… a pit into the abyss? So extrapolating from this information, and the small finger armor we see on the Asura’s right hand that depicts a claw in addition to the Shadow armor shoulders that appear to be used we can now safely assume that the Elite Specialization will be called Belinda’s Revenge and Necros will get Tricks from the Thief class as their new utilities.

I doubt we’re getting shouts. My honest to goodness opinion? Marjory probably the biggest hint to our new elite specialization. She has a greatsword imbued with her sister’s ghost. The entire specialization is probably going to be a throw back to Ritualists and old GW1 (edit with link) weapon spells

Expect conjured weaps for Necro speciliazation. One of our biggest weaknesses is the ability to actually do anything for the rest of our party, and this will be how they try and rectify that gap. But that’s just my two cents on the matter.

Bhawb.7408:

That I absolutely agree with. The recent outcry has happened at an appropriate time when they are allowed a lot of resources to address things, so maybe we’ll get lucky. Lots of feedback + resources to actually use it could cause changes.

This right here.

I’ve been mostly lurking these forums since the Pre-release of the game. I’ve long since opted to just silently watch, and for the most part agree with many of the users I’ve come to recognize as contributing and constructive members of the Necromancer community (one that I tend to ignore, because I find the toxicity of the board to be hard to stomach sometimes).

However with all the changes I saw coming to Engineer, and then nothing for Necromancer, I’m with Bhawb. Now’s probably the best shot we have to kick and make a huge fuss about the state of our class. They’ve demonstrated they’re not afraid to strip traitlines down to nothing and start fresh with the Engineer, and now we need them to realize that our class needs them to go through everything with a fine toothed comb.

It’s gotten to the point where everybody sees it. Where everybody is aware of it. Very few people are able to keep their heads in the sand about this any longer. Frankly, the fact that this outrage is spilling out not just into other sections of these forums, but into Reddit, and onto news sites means that Anet simply can’t continue to ignore the problems of this class.

I’ve loved playing a Necromancer since the early days of GW1. And to a degree, I still enjoy playing it now in GW2, but there’s only so much abuse a community can take. People are lashing out, and frankly, I think it’s earned at this point.

While not a perfect solution, I’ve spoken with the moderator and he suggested reposting with a different title. So I went ahead and made a new post that can be found here . I’ve also included a link to the original discussion happening on Reddit, because I recognized a fair number of users on there that shouldn’t have to copy and paste their posts because this is a new thread. However I’m hoping it gets back up to the front page so that this article gets the attention it needs.

I got in touch with one of the moderators on the subreddit. The post wasn’t deleted, just removed from the front page. The moderator removed it “because of the clickbait title”.

Welp, depending on final numbers I’m probably going to tool around with Spite/DM/Soul Reaping since my power build won’t need the added benefit of the Prec from Curses anymore.

So I’m thinking something along the lines of:
Spite: Bitter Chill, Chill of Death, and Close to Death
DM: Putrid Defense, Deadly Strength, Unholy Sanctuary
SR: Speed of Shadows , Spectral Mastery, and Death Perception

Alternatively, if the power gain from Deadly Strength turns out to be rubbish after they finally set the numbers in stone I can always swap to Greater Marks in DM and Soul Marks in SR. Theoretically, I may end up being able to tank a bit more despite being a glass canon, but I’m not keeping my hopes up.

I find it sad though that I have to give up some of those Curses Minor traits for this build… but I just don’t see any third Grandmaster Trait that meshes nicely with Powermancer sadly.

One thing I’m annoyed about is they never touched on our Elites, or how some of these traits will now effect them since all skills are getting put into a skill category.

For instance, is Lich Form becoming a Spectral Skill? If so the elite is getting a massive buff thanks to Spectral Mastery (Returning to 30s Duration when traited with a 144 cooldown when traited).

While I definitely see how some of these traits can be interesting, what I think is going to happen is we’ll see basically builds turning heavily towards our Elite Specialization. As it stands Power builds will be going Spite and Soul Reaping with the Elite specialization and Condi builds going Curses and Soul Reaping with the Elite specialization.

All I can see from this is them basically hoping to hell that they can force us to use Blood Magic and Death Magic by making it so we don’t need to spec into both Curses and Spite regardless of our build, but the end of the day Blood Magic is still garbage and Death Magic seems only slightly less so.

I won’t be surprised if Power Necros start speccing into Death Magic, as the additional gains while in DS mesh with Death Perception but even that seems to be stretching it.

Will there be any changes to the functionality of Necromancer Minions come the expansion, or more importantly will some of the more frustrating pathing issues associated with them be getting looked at?

Will transformations (Moa, Lich, Plague) still put all Minions on Cooldown?

The blog post mentions new means of utilizing Life Force, are there any specifics concerning this change that you are allowed to disclose, such as will they be tied to the core traits or will this be tied to the as of yet unnamed Greatsword necro speciliazation?

Can we expect any changes to the Bloodmagic traitline? In particular health syphons and how they’re still obsolete as a class mechanic?

The blogpost also mentions that Focused Rituals will be getting removed. Is this trait geting replaced with something else?

Out of mild curiousity, has your overall outlook on the Necromancer been changed over the last 2 years. In the beginning, the design team seemed interested in making the Necromancer ‘the attrition class’. A class that once you’re engaged with, is impossible to get away. Considering how this design philosophy for the Necromancer is largely a failure (the Necromancer is the hardest class to disengage with and simultaneously the easiest class to disengage from), how do you intend to move forward with the class come the expansion. Will you be revisiting this design philosophy or do you intend to rework the Necromancer to fill a different role than you originally set out to do?

He said Ascended Armour Box. Armour Boxes aren’t made, they’re dropped as loot.

All ascended items are account bound, you cannot sell them.

All I’m seeing is a lost opportunity at Ascended Armour?

In all honesty, I think Faolain, while is an opportunist who will use this revelation to advance the Nightmare Court’s clout among the Sylvari. I do not personally think she wants the Sylvari to be under the dominion of the Mordremoth any more than she wants the Sylvari to be under the dominion of the Pale Tree’s code of ethics.

She has been a fairly large proponent of Sylvari independence. While she may use the fact that they were meant to be Dragon Minions as a proof that the Nightmare Court is closer attuned to the natural predisposition of ‘Ends justify the means’ and the overall advancing of SM in Sylvari culture… she seems to proud and willful to want to willingly subject herself to another beings will as opposed to another.

I genuinely foresee there being moments in Heart of Thorns where we will be forced to work alongside Faolain, and probably help the Nightmare Court in some stereotypical fashion where ‘the greater good demands we work together, only to have them use it to further themselves in the process’ that Anet seems to enjoy (cough Joko cough cough). I make this theory on the basis that I think the Nightmare Court will be more prone to Corruption than other Sylvari, and that Faolain will be loathe to lose control over her precious Nightmare Court to some upstart dragon who wants to hog the power all to himself.

Alternatively, Faolain will be this great big Corrupted Boss we all fight alongside Caithe, ending with Faolain’s death and Caithe finally burying that skeleton that’s been rattling about in her closet all this time.

Gather all, and listen to what I am about to tell you. Such is my prophecy, told unto me by the Six True Gods, and so I pass now unto ye.

Ware the train of hype, for its warm eyes and charming smile hide what lays within. Conducted by the devil, the train does not lead to paradise, as many of its drunken revelers would tell ye, it leads instead to a pit of despair. On the day of reckoning, the train will fall off the Cliffs of Desolation, taking all into a realm of nightmare.

There will be no spears, no new weapons for any profession. For such is not the way prosperity through peace that the ’Dev’ils would proclaim.

There will be no new class crawling from the pit, no… only the same old classes will pull free from the wreckage, and they will have hearts festering black with anger and molded by the stains of betrayal. The revelers would cry of new skills as they invite you onto their canflageration of doom, but of such there will be none.

‘Ware the train and it’s ‘hype’! ‘Ware the revelers in their pre-emptive celebrations! The forums will run red with the post of ’Dev’ils, proclaiming they made no such promises. They say an An’Gaile will descend in an attempt to restore order, but she will be pelted with the stones and slings of trolls from the realms below. ’Ware fair reader! ’Ware!

Such was the prophecy I heard, and such has it been passed on. ’Ware you who will tread soon in a land bereft of hope and reason, a land where trolls rule both caverns, jungle, and the realms of Men, Norn, Charr, Asura, and Sylvari. ’Ware the Heart of Thorns, for it will make you bleed.

Actually the wiki hinted at the state of the Maguuma jungle at release.

Wiki

The Maguuma Wastes are an area north of the Tarnished Coast. They are formed from the portions of the Maguuma Jungle that have mysteriously dried out over the years. Although this is commonly attributed to the Elder Dragons, there may be other agents at work.¹

So the area we are in has been known to have become an Arid wasteland-esque area for sometime, as we are still in what is being attributed as the Maguuma Wastes. So this is more or less what I had been expecting when we first started exploring it.

So while ‘BLAME MORDREMOTH’ is true, we could have any number of factors. The Druid Spirits which were known to inhabit the area may have become under attack among any number of things. For instance, I think we’re approaching the areas that were fed by waters with healing properties originally, but these all seem to have dried up. Why?

Okay, crazy question as I tend to not log in at all… but what if Shadows is actually referring to Menzies sphere of influence? In GW1, there actually was no Darkness or Shadow affiliation with the Gods that I know of. Having checked the old wiki, the closest we get is Menzies. And while he may not be worshiped by Humans as a God, he is the brother of Balthazar, and could theoretically have similar power.

In addition, because the lines don’t perfectly match up and spheres of influence in the Pantheon tend to change more often than not, we also see that Lyssa was predominantly the patron for all manner of energy management. We see that she was offered the patronage of “energy storage elementalists, mysticism dervishes, and mesmers” source. This to me links her not only with Illusions (which I personally read as Mind but I think that’s a fairly debatable topic) but some kind of Energy. While I’m hesitant to just say “MAGIC” like a dweeb, because all the Elder Dragons consume all kinds of Magic, there seems to be a connection with the manipulation of this force and a sphere of influence. Would this give some kind of Correlation with Kralkatorrik whom we see plenty of lightning strikes (a form of energy) and branded elementals (air elemental skins)? This is of course, assuming you can consider Energy a sphere of influence.

Also, we saw in the transference of power from Abaddon to Kormir that “Secrets” became “Truth”. Honestly, this to me feels like a propaganda change on Kormir’s part. I think it’d be easier to refer to this sphere of influence as “Knowledge”, as accounts of Abaddon and Kormir in their respective roles in the Pantheon, are often considered ‘wise and intelligent’. Secrets and Truth are simply forms of Knowledge, and the malleability of what its called seems to offer some wiggle room here as to exactly what the spheres of influence can be.

Which kind of brings me to my next last point. The Sphere’s of influence as we know them with the Human’s aren’t likely to be copy-pastable to the Dragons. The names of their sphere’s have changed again and again and again as the Gods in the Pantheon change again and again and again.

So that’s why I think it’s likely safer to read Lyssa’s influence over ‘Illusions’ is in reality influence over ‘Minds’. Illusions are simply that, tricking the mind into thinking something is there when it’s not.

In addition that would easily allow for Nature to become “Plants”. So what if some of these others are straight up not spheres of influence (I’m looking at you ‘War’ and ‘Courage’) or simply sphere’s of influence that could go by synonymous names? It’d open up for things like Primordius holding the sphere of influence over Fire and Earth for instance. Or Earth potentially being a more broadened term for Crystals thus giving it to Kralky?

I think I’m rambling at this point and will go back to quietly watching this discussion.

Ummmmmm, wat? Minus the weapons that didn’t exist in GW1, how are they inferior looking? They’re the same skin with some glossy finsih to them? Only the Shield no longer looks it’s made of purple plexi-glass.

The Axe, Sword, Dagger, Hammer… these are looking straight out of GW1 to me. Or am I missing something here?

I don’t miss being told I need a full stack of summoning stones to get into Underworld.
I don’t miss how unless you were running a farming build, you couldn’t even find groups for some dungeons (I’m looking at you SoO and UW).
I don’t miss people being able to skip 90% of the content in Prophecies (There’s a Jungle? There’s a Desert?!)
I also think people look back on the writing of that game with HUGE bias. Prophecies was a disjointed mess of ‘chase after this new villain’ every five minutes. Shiro Tagatchi going from ‘dumb as a sack of bricks’ in every flash back cutscene you see to a mastermind smart enough to plot his own resurrection.
I don’t miss how certain builds were absolutely useless in some areas (You want to MM in a map with no exploitable corpses? Good luck with that). Oh yeah, you CAN swap your traits and skills really easily. But you still need an entire second set of runed armor and specific weapons for different builds. So that hasn’t changed. My necromancer had 4-5 different armor sets, each with a different rune set up based on my build.
You want to get up that ramp but you have to walk all the way to a corner that isn’t higher than your shin to get up it? Have fun walkin’!

Was GW1 a good game? It was a great game! I loved it. I sank more time than is healthy for somebody to sink into a video game. However it had some very glaring faults. I have great memories of it, but ultimately I’m not likely to ever play it again.

I’m not sure Paizo would appreciate Anet making an armor based on some of their artwork for Pathfinder. But yeah, if the Heavy Phalanx had turned out similar for female characters, I’d have no problem making a new character just to have it for them. Like you mentioned, the change in Aesthetics between the two genders is too radical. I don’t mind so much the skin being shown, but that the two look like completely different armor sets. I had similar complaints about the Vabbian Armor on GW1 for the necromancer. The two armor sets were just so jarringly different! I understood what they went for with the male (I thought they were at least going for a Vizier look), but man on man it did not turn out well.

I think actually my problem with the Vigil armor for female characters is that the asymetry is on the wrong side. The larger shoulder pad should be on the right shoulder, as if I remember correctly, shields are equipped in the left hand. You don’t need more armor on the shield arm because it add’s disproportionate weight/unnecessary protection to an arm that is already got additional armor. I’d love to see the shoulder moved to the right arm, but otherwise I enjoy the assymetry there personally.

I don’t mind the overall aesthetic of the Temple Armor though, in fact I’d simply like to see something similar in design with a less ‘Dark Knight’ look and more of a paladin style to it. I find the Female Characters in this game are in dire need of some serious ‘Knight in Shining Full Plate’ looks on a whole.

“Give me a reason to enjoy killing you slowly"

Sorry? What were you saying about needing to show skin with that mentality? See attached image.

Totally realize that it’s really just taking a pot shot at the one line, but I do want to make a legit commentary here and not just poking fun at you.

This entire thread is going to spark a huge debate because of the subjectivity of fashion. There really is no right or wrong answer here because everybody’s going to lean towards different things. Do I personally have anything against showing some skin? Considering I do have T3 on my female necro, not at all. However my other armor set for them that gets used more frequently covers every inch of her.

Ultimately this entire thread is going to devolve very quickly into a back and forth about how you dislike one armor and then another person’s going to go “but way I like that armor” which is precisely what happening with the whole T3 and Flamekissed armor fiasco.

My recommendation is just to agree to disagree and hope that Anet makes more armors that are to your liking. As changing armors mid-game is, to be perfectly frank, kinda problematic as your very post indicates.

This thread may actually get more constructive posts in the Lore/Story section, because this involves more about what Lore we know about Liches in terms of GW Universe.

Also spoiler warning ahead. If you haven’t played GW1 and intend to but don’t want its story ruined feel free to turn away.

That being said, we know for certain two different Liches that have existed in the GW Universe along with a smattering of other cases of ‘longer than natural life’ or ‘unlife’ as it were.

The two Liches we know of are Vizier Kilbron and Palawa Joko.

It’s heavily implied (albeit never confirmed) that Vizier Khilbron’s Lichdom was a side effect of him reading the Forbidden Scrolls beneath Orr that caused the Cataclysm. As he promptly also began using the undead of the Nation as a personal army against Kryta in his search for the Staff of Orr.

Then we have Palawa Joko. We honestly don’t know much about how he attained Unlife Immortal save that he had some kind of relationship with Khilbron. Whether they were friends at one time, co-conspirators, peers in the school of Necromancy doesn’t ever really say. However since his lichdom, he’s mostly been a scourge for all of Elona using Undead armies/ghosts to invade from the inhospitable wastes of the Desolation south of the Crystal Desert.

Other characters more pertinent to GW2 with some form of power after death you could describe probably include characters like the Mad King. As well as somebody else who is apparently still alive from GW1 but that’s a spoiler I don’t feel comfortable getting into (though apparently you should read Sea of Sorrows if you’re interested). TIP: They’re also a Necromancer.

The last clue we have towards ‘Liches’ in the Guild Wars universe is the current elite skill labeled ‘Lich Form’. This doesn’t appear to be your typical understanding of Liches as you turn into the jolly green giant. There’s no ritual involved and the effect is temporary. While you do take on a more demonic appearance (similar to Vizier Khilbron’s Lich form in some respects) you do not gain any other similarities to being undead.

Both Khilbron and Joko have shown that Liches in the Guild Wars universe though, and I mean actual Liches, are notoriously powerful and also dreadfully hard to kill. Khilbron for instance needed to be killed on a Bloodstone as a sacrifice, using it to power the Soul Barrier that locked the Foundry of Failed Creations away from Tyria.

Joko was actually buried ‘alive’ in a tomb for hundreds of years before he was released due to the magic weakening with Abbadon’s incursion. He was so powerful they literally could not kill him, merely imprison him. He survives to this day as the King of Elona after having conquered it years after the events of Guild Wars: Nightfall.

I’ve had this problem as well, and this is made more frustrating because the two retailers for Gem Cards in Canada (EB Games and Best Buy) refuse to keep the things stocked because they never sell them, or at least the ones in my area. So I have no means of giving my friends upgrades or buying them Gems for Christmas.

Step One: Get the most flamboyant armor set you can find.
Step Two: Dye it entirely purple and pink
Step Three: Make Bifrost
Step Four: Go to WvW
Step Five: ????
Step Six: Profit

EDIT: Also for the sake of seriousness, you’ll find that the fashion taste of Necros on this board are ‘Skulls and Bones or go home’. However that being said, I agree that Frostfang actually makes a good looking skin, especially with all the cripples and chills we have at our disposal to snare with.

Not mine, but I thought it was deserving of some kind of mention.

My mate named his Sylvari Necromancer “Liliana of the Vale”. As somebody who plays MTG, I was rather jealous of his creativity.

Doctor Edward Said’s theory of Orientalism. Lookit up, because Cantha is a textbook example of it.

It’s yes and no about the mixing of cultures, and less so about political correctness than just perception.

Essentially Cantha represented a generalized, abstraction of the ‘East’. It’s the ‘East’ because it has all of those iconographic ideas that make us think of the Orient (Dragons, Ninjas, and Samurai OH MY!), but isn’t actually anything like the Orient. It’s kind of like going to Vegas and then thinking ‘oh, so this is what Paris and Venice must be like’.

Essentially it’s like when people boil down the States as nothing but a bunch of gun totting, red necks who scream " ‘MURRICA! FOOTBALL!" and assume that’s just how every American must logically be because that’s the stereotypical American. Just being Canadian, I met Europeans and Australians who’s only idea of what Canadians were like were from the McKenzie Brothers and Epic Meal Time. It’s neither flattering nor accurate nor appreciated (though sometimes humorous).

So yeah, people have the right to care about how their culture is interpreted, assuming that that was the case anyways. I don’t think any confirmation was given to the theory.

Homonavn.6348:

WAAAY to much arah sets…

This is my mix ’n match set.

I like it! Good use of SE shoulders, that armor set doesn’t see nearly enough love in my opinion.

And yeah I agree on the Arah thing. Honestly, I’m not fond of it personally. I find the shoulders are way too bulky for my tastes, and the hood is complete meh. Kind of glad I didn’t post my Condition armor gear though. I don’t think the guys on this board would appreciate the amount of fabulous that it possesses.

Welp, glad I can at the very least continue proving that age old adage about assumptions right. Much obliged for the explanation on the bug Kiriakulos!