Guild Wars 2

ArenaNet could easily make all 3 Dagger skills worth using, that’s mostly a matter of numbers.

As I said, bleed debuff on Dark Pact, then baseline Life Siphon damage increase, replacing it with generating Life Force when used on bleeding targets.

We could get away with just adding bleed to AA, but that would cement the rotation to autoattacks. If we’re doing this for PvE, let’s make all 3 skills worth using.

Joining the discussion, Staff is possibly an option. If we’re going for SR anyways, the adept tier offers Soul Marks and there aren’t better group pve options. I could see Staff being used in situations when you can get value out of AA piercing. It also has a condition transfer for Corruptions, although very low damage and not that interesting playstyle for PvE (apart from positioning for piercing maybe). I’d welcome it as an alternative to D/D in AoE fights.

One last thing the community may be overlooking is that ArenaNet’s plan for Scourge could be making us invest into Vitality, since Scourge skills costs are set values, not percentages. Maybe there is some Viper’s gear with Vitality instead of precision/power, who knows.

Death Magic, as of now, is probably the least used specialization out of all. While others also have some traits that beg for a rework (like Unholy Martyr in Blood Magic that’s way too niche for GM), DM is absolutely plagued by those.

I’ll list few observations of mine:

• The specialization is heavily centred around swapping in and out of Shroud/staying in Shroud for extended periods of time, moreso than Soul Reaping – All such traits lose quite a bit of value with Scourge and none is particulary powerful as of now.

• Soul Reaping, Blood Magic both provide better defense than Death Magic – the defensive specialization.

• Unholy Sanctuary, a GM trait that was mediocre even right after Specialization update is hillariously weak with Scourge – it’s basically a second Regeneration for 7s. It’s only reediming factor would be the interaction between Desert Shroud and Dhuumfire, but that’s digging deep for any purpose.

• Soul Comprehension – Yes, this infamous trait. On multiple occassions necro players have expressed that it’s basically like not having a master minor. We know that you’ve added it for “the theme”, but it’s so incredibly weak and niche that you got to scratch your head when reading it.

• We have three (!) separate traits for one utility type – minions. I get that many people love idea of running around with five or six permanent body shields, but that’s neither a big identity of Necromancer in GW2 nor is effective. Minions we use tend to be utility-heavy (in what direction I believe all Minions should move to be useful) and apart from non-competitive full MM builds (and Rise!) Necromancers may use 1-2 at time, not 6.
  Please, baseline some of those traits’ aspects and combine 3 into 1 Grandmaster, freeing up the space.

• Death Magic has no real “selling point”. The only real reason to run it was/is in PvE for Death Nova. The traitline won’t give some major defenses, it doesn’t really have any exciting traits and, apart from minions, has little synergy within itself. It’s far too heavy on Minions which don’t work well in GW2.

I would welcome a critical look at the specialization for the upcoming balance patch & expansion.

1) stat
2) stat
3) stat
4) Gain Barrier when you remove a condition (x ICD)
5) stat
6) Barriers you apply:

• Last longer before decaying

• Cause affected allies to siphon an additional 2-3% outgoing damage as health

• Increase affected allies’ Toughness by x

• Heal for x% of the damage they had prevented

• Increase your Concentration/Healing Power on affected targets

• Decay faster, but are more potent

• Give a stack of Stability (ICD per target)

• Heal for a small amount when affected ally is disabled (CC’d) (ICD per target)

• Are more potent on allies below health treshold

Just throwing random ideas out.

Stats are tbd, but I’d see Condition Duration among them.

Kaladel.1670:

Rym.1469:

Kaladel.1670:

Rym.1469:

What I always wanted from Plaguelands is to work like a plague, allowing enemies to spread it around. Basically, the existing Plaguelands, but ground targeted. Enemies walking through it or being struck by the initial cast would expand Plaguelands effect as as trail behind them when moving for a few seconds

I hear people QQing in the WvW forum of an alternative reality where the skill works like this. This could be absolutely devastating for zergs in this mode and an instant target for the nerfbat.

But I like the idea of something that spread like a plague. Some sort of effect that could be strong on the first target and weaker on every subsidiary target. Something like this :

• Initial target : weakness, blind, bleed, poison, burning
• Secondary target : weakness, blind, bleed, poison
• Tertiary target : weakness, blind, bleed
  …
  Until there is no more condi or target. Can’t affect the same target more than once per cast.

This is just a brief descreption of the idea. My actual mechanical visualization was a delayed area explosion that creates the initial Plaguelands zone and players struck by that explosion would get the spreading debuff.
Not necessarily everyone that gets in contact with the AoE, since that would be really snowbally.

This is still potentialy OP in this kind of confrontation. The ability to affect so many players with one skill and the fact that it will probably change the way people are zerging (no character standing close, to reduce the potential of the skill to affect other targets, other consequences implied by a less packed zerg, etc.)

Epidemic 2.0

The explosion would have a limit of 3-5 targets, be delayed and 60-80 trail width which is relatively thin. On top of that, even if hit, I doubt it would mean a sudden death to an entire zerg like Epidemic was – as long as the afflicted player noticed the debuff and had it in mind not to move through the entire zerg, possibly move away for a few seconds. If this was still proven not to be enough, I could see a WvW-specific “grace period” of 1 or 2 seconds before the spreading debuff starts working due to WvW lags.

Ultimately, we can’t test it, but I see it as a rather interactive, thematic Elite skill with a solid dose of counterplay. While I don’t deny the power of Necromancer in WvW, I’d hold on with judging it as an Epidemic 2.0. I’d argue that Ghastly Breach is better contender for this title in WvW than the suggested Plague.

Kaladel.1670:

Rym.1469:

What I always wanted from Plaguelands is to work like a plague, allowing enemies to spread it around. Basically, the existing Plaguelands, but ground targeted. Enemies walking through it or being struck by the initial cast would expand Plaguelands effect as as trail behind them when moving for a few seconds

I hear people QQing in the WvW forum of an alternative reality where the skill works like this. This could be absolutely devastating for zergs in this mode and an instant target for the nerfbat.

But I like the idea of something that spread like a plague. Some sort of effect that could be strong on the first target and weaker on every subsidiary target. Something like this :

• Initial target : weakness, blind, bleed, poison, burning
• Secondary target : weakness, blind, bleed, poison
• Tertiary target : weakness, blind, bleed
  …
  Until there is no more condi or target. Can’t affect the same target more than once per cast.

This is just a brief descreption of the idea. My actual mechanical visualization was a delayed area explosion that creates the initial Plaguelands zone and players struck by that explosion would get the spreading debuff.
Not necessarily everyone that gets in contact with the AoE, since that would be really snowbally.

I’m not a fan of Plaguelands, I have to say.

The concept of a condition AoE that grows in power every second is cool, but;

• The skill has barely any visual effects. Rework is a rework, so I won’t be harsh here but eventually I’d like some thematic, not over-the-top animation.

• Plaguelands and Ghastly Breach feel too similar mechanically. Both are AoE condition zones you drop at your feet, the only difference is that Plaguelands deals more flat damage while Breach corrupts. Even changed targeting for one of them would’ve been a welcome characteristic. Currently it feels like one elite, but with a different glyph/rune effect.

• Plaguelands is yet another tool in Necromancer’s toolkit of area denial, on top of core tools for that (Wells, CPC, Marks, Epidemic…) and Scourge brings even more of it. Perhaps we could see slight diversification in here.

What I always wanted from Plaguelands is to work like a plague, allowing enemies to spread it around. Basically, the existing Plaguelands, but ground targeted. Enemies walking through it or being struck by the initial cast would expand Plaguelands effect as as trail behind them when moving for a few seconds – and there is no better class that forces movement than Necromancer.
This alone would make the skill different enough from Ghastly Breach.

Next time, consider reading whole tooltip before posting.

Kam.4092:

mazut.4296:

Rym.1469:

I agree with the topic. I think the consensus is that we would still want to keep Dagger as a power weapon, but offer a bit of condition pressure to open up more builds and lessen the DPS drop switching to it in a Condition build would cause.

Thankfully, Path of Fire has given us the charge/ammo mechanic. Along with it, many underperforming skills on weapons such as Throw Axe on Warrior were given this new tech. I would actually do the same with Dark Pact and this topic is a good place to suggest such thing.

So, to please both sides I’d go with the version of Dark Pact linked in attachments. For few seconds, every Dagger hit would cause bleeding (duration is tbd) on a foe stuck by the ability. This would add another skill to the possible rotation as maybe even bring Life Siphon into it, since the skill hits 9 times.

This is pretty decent idea, it might make it to powerful tho. Probably should work only on auto attacks. But it turns the weapon both power and condi at the same time. I like having versatile options.

After some consideration I think this is actually great idea. Can work with both power and add that slightly lacking damage(compared to other dagger using professions). Also can tun into hybrid weapon. However the buff shouldn’t be more then 8sec. long and also doesn’t really benefit from ammo mechanic, except for the immobilize part. We will swap to this weapon and back to our main weapon on cd if using it as condi supplement weapon set. So more then 8 sec duration is overkill. Also the trait need to change obviously. Maybe something like:
-Chance on hit: 20-33% double attack(Necrotic Slash) (also another way to apply more bleeds)
-flat movement speed increase: 15% in combat
-Dagger Skill Recharge Reduced: 20%

Even if they buffed the Trait for Dagger, we wouldn’t be using Blood Magic over Soul Reaping. Soul Reaping has too much that helps Scourge for DPS and support. Also Necrotic Slash already hits twice by default.

These are good ideas, but they sort of over complicate an easy problem to fix. Just adding a Condition to the Mainhand Dagger auto attack fixes things.

I think if we are already discussing adding conditions to dagger for the sake of PvE, making sure Necromancers get to use more than just auto-attack would be a good idea. Especially Life Siphon, since it’s such a good animation, but we were never able to really make use of it in PvE.

Add what it takes to those skills, in the end the condition-addition change can be made just for PvE.

Kam.4092:

Rym.1469:

I agree with the topic. I think the consensus is that we would still want to keep Dagger as a power weapon, but offer a bit of condition pressure to open up more builds and lessen the DPS drop switching to it in a Condition build would cause.

Thankfully, Path of Fire has given us the charge/ammo mechanic. Along with it, many underperforming skills on weapons such as Throw Axe on Warrior were given this new tech. I would actually do the same with Dark Pact and this topic is a good place to suggest such thing.

So, to please both sides I’d go with the version of Dark Pact linked in attachments. For few seconds, every Dagger hit would cause bleeding (duration is tbd) on a foe stuck by the ability. This would add another skill to the possible rotation as maybe even bring Life Siphon into it, since the skill hits 9 times.

That’s a good idea overall, but the self Bleeding does a lot of damage, and with an ammo mechanic could kill you easy. Having to use Life Siphon defeats the purpose of the Dagger. Switching to the dagger is solely for Life Force as Scourge to maintain DPS with Sand Shades.

Life Siphon is a 3 second cast, which would be 33% of the 9 second weapon swap CD wasted. Dark Pact is a 1 second cast, which would give 8 seconds left to gain Life Force before switching back. It wouldn’t really have to be an ammo mechanic, but just a short buff to work, because we wouldn’t be staying in it forever.

If they did add a Condition to Mainhand Dagger, they might have to nerf the Power Damage and scaling to balance it. So your idea is a good idea.

In a support Condition Build that would be using Mainhand Dagger mainly, it might kill you though with an ammo mechanic, unless you had Offhand Dagger for Deathly Swarm, or a good healer in a Raid.

The self-bleeding already exists on the skill and on live it’s 2x with the same duration. I just split both Corruption and self-bleed over two charges. With Quickness, Dagger builds Life Force very quickly. Both Dark Pact and Life Siphon cast times go down in half with that boon.

I agree with the topic. I think the consensus is that we would still want to keep Dagger as a power weapon, but offer a bit of condition pressure to open up more builds and lessen the DPS drop switching to it in a Condition build would cause.

Thankfully, Path of Fire has given us the charge/ammo mechanic. Along with it, many underperforming skills on weapons such as Throw Axe on Warrior were given this new tech. I would actually do the same with Dark Pact and this topic is a good place to suggest such thing.

So, to please both sides I’d go with the version of Dark Pact linked in attachments. For few seconds, every Dagger hit would cause bleeding (duration is tbd) on a foe stuck by the ability. This would add another skill to the possible rotation as maybe even bring Life Siphon into it, since the skill hits 9 times.

So as we are heading into PoF, one of my main criticism of the Scourge is that it’s Elite, Ghastly Breach, feels quite similar gameplay-wise to Plaguelands. The problem with Ghastly Breach is that it’s created in such a way that it synergises well with Feed from Corruption.
So instead, I’d strongly suggest ArenaNet to change Plaguelands yet again and spice it up in such a way that both abilities would differ more from each other.

My suggestion for it is included below in attachements. But, being honest, anything cool would do, even being able to ground-target place Plaguelands. Or maybe attach it to an enemy with a skillshot?

Shorter feedback on Scourge, as I played a bit less of it.

Torch

• Harrowing Wave could use something extra to spice it up. Possibly some Life Force generation. Maybe generating Life Force when it hits CC’d/Feared enemy? You can still Fear PvE Bosses.

Punishments

• The skills themselves are mostly fine and number tweaks have already been suggested. My main complaint here however, is the Elite. It’s stunning visually, but mechanically…it’s not really that unique or interesting. Recently (well, this year) we got a rework for Plague. Plague and Ghastly Breach are two Elites on one class that feel incredibly similar on the gameplay level and I’m not sure if I’m a fan of that. Reworking Plaguelands again to have some better identity would be welcome. I’d suggest something like this.

• Sand Swell – I think changing it from 900 range to 1200 wouldn’t hurt much.

• Heal – Could heal a bit more. 1k-2k.

Traits

• Those are fine, really. It’s just that I’m still missing some cool trait or skill that would make use of Scourge-Sand Shade positioning. Something like sending a wave from Shade towards the Player that burns enemies and Regenerates allies. Replacing Sadistic Searing maybe?

Shade Mechanics

• First of, Path of Corruption needs a nerf specific for the Scourge because it’s frankly ridiculous with Nefarious Favor. 6-10s ICD per target.

• Desert Shroud bug, triggering Shade attacks on every pulse, is probably known already, but I still do mention it.

• Barriers are a reactive/protactive mechanic and skills that grant it (Desert Shroud and Sand Cascade) have to be instant, as they are. However, Garish Pillar and Nefarious Favor don’t have to be instant and probably shouldn’t be. A short cast time for those would be handy for balance I feel, like 1/4s for both.

• Add animations that will warn players of incoming Shade abilities. Visual ones. Currently counterplay almost doesn’t exist, aside from…not being near Scourge and Shades. That might be tricky in a conquest mode.

Renegade – PvP/PvX PoV – Longer, but definite feedback

Kalla Scorchrazor:

• Summons are similar to Wells, but if Wells could be killed/CC’d. That’s unecessary – summons are not powerful enough to justify being interactable. They are stationary, the counterplay is like for Wells. Icerazor and Razorclaw don’t need cooldowns. Slightly too high energy costs across the board.

• Heal – Costs 10 Energy, while all other heals cost 5, for no reason. Low base healing. Stunbreak is useful, but it’s the only stunbreak on the Legend – you often waste either stunbreak or heal. Please move the stunbreak to other skill.

• Icerazor lacks purpose. Very low power-scalling, short Vulnerability uptime. The summon often fails to cleave downed players. Currently, no reason to summon, apart from being 20x hit for some effects. I assume Razorclaw&Soulcleave will get an ICD, so I don’t count their synergy.

Traits

• Bleed-improving effects of Blood Fury and Heartpiercer don’t work rn.

• Ashen Demeanor could have 1s ICD. Gameplay of Revenant involves a lot of chain-CC to do damage.

• Wrought-Iron Will could have the radius increased to 360 – being a glassy damage dealer, you often stay at edges of fight, so 240 is too short for allies.

• Sudden Reversal – Should ignore Blind, to help against Thief dive..

• Lasting Legacy is currently the dominant trait, doubling the reason for taking Renegade (more damage).

• Righteous Rebel to compete with Lasting Legacy could also heal per Kalla’s Fervor gained. The Alacrity improvement could easily go baseline.

• Vindication – the Might duration is too short. 5-6 seconds would be the sweet spot. Alternatively, split the durations between game modes.

Shortbow

• As 900 range weapon, it puts you into range of many more skills than a 1200 range one, closer to the action. Therefore, it requires a defensive skill. I suggest #4 becoming it, working similary to Wards from GW1 – a defensive zone. Too low damage across the board. Skills 2 and 3 could use some cast time reductions – especially #3 since it’s a hard skillshot.

• Sevenshot (#3) – Arrows dissapear on collision with terrain. “Reverse shotgun” feels unrewarding, player barely ever has a chance to hit 7 shots, most of the time it’s 2-3. Currently bugged with Instant ground targeting, allowing to adjust the focal point instead of it being set at the max range (Youtube Video). The skill with the bug feels much better and more fluid, rewarding good aim – should be the official version. Hitting someone with focal point should reward extra damage – #3 is the hardest skillshot in the game. Should be the main source of Shortbow’s damage, coolest skill.

• Spiritcrush (#4) lacks purpose. Low damage, both power and condition, Slow doesn’t do much with Revenant (unreliable Interrupts, no interrupt traits). Cannot be cast behind the character, often bugs out on bridges. Prime candidate for a rework to a defensive skill.

• Scorchrazor (#5) – Great ability and feeling, just needs to be ground-targeted/skillshot.

Citadel Orders

• Too high Energy costs across the board. Consider adding a second resource for them if they can’t cost way less.

• Heroic Command – Kalla’s Fervor is so easy to come by that refresh isn’t that useful. AoE Might is ok, but consider Stability/Barrier maybe.

• Citadel Bombardment – Vastly too overcosted, provides no damage unless used against big, crowded groups. Should be tighter for PvP. Currently, not useful in PvP/against low number of targets at all.

• Orders from Above – The best Order skill so far. Alacrity is always handy. Renegade desperately needs cleanses – make this Order cleanse a condition every pulse.

My criticsm of Vindication’s might-stacking effect is that it lasts for just 3 seconds base. It can absolutely get to higher numbers if you hit multiple targets on regular basis, but that mostly happens in WvW. In organised WvW groups, I don’t need that much self-mightstacking already because between people in the squad/group Might is already covered.

In PvP, what is the focus of the video, those stacks of Might don’t get that high, especially if you happen to be skirmishing a lot. And then, even if Might gets to respectable level, due to duration it will drop off very quickly.
Increasing the duration per stack to 5-6 seconds would make Vindication more of an option.

However, as I said in the video, the reason why you would go for Renegade as condi rev in PvP is the fat damage modifier. If I wanted Might, I have it in Herald. Doubling the damage modifier just goes along the best with what I want from the specialization and that’s what makes Lasting Legacy so dominant. Righteous Rebel takes the second place because it provides something every Condition Revenant wants – defense. Vindication brings something Condi Rev already has in PvP, together with an improvement to the worst Citadel Order of all.
Thanks for watching the video.

Swapping beastmodes would likely result in a nerf to Beastmode as a whole.

I could see this functionality as a trait, replacing Eternal Bond maybe, but it would be still quite powerful. Name of the trait and odd lack of synergy would suggest that Eternal Bond had been what I’m saying in the past, but turned out to be too broken so they changed it to the proc.

I doubt the idea of the specialization is to camp Beastmode and never see your pet again.

If you want to have viable Warrior builds in PvP, accept that as a melee class they need some sustain.

Currently, I see no problems for Spellbreaker here. It can either be ran with Defense and Adrenal Health or Strength with Might makes Right, but you won’t run both at the cost of losing Discipline and Fast Hands most likely.

Recorded the “bug”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tDgACIFuNI

I was also told it works only with “Allow Skill Retargeting enabled”.

The bug is something I actually highly requested in my yesterday’s video with first impressions on the Shortbow, before I knew of the bug. I compared the ability to Arcane Missiles, Li-Ming’s ability from Heroes of the Storm, same as Noctis. The skillshot pattern with AMissiles and “bugged” version of Sevenshot is exactly the same and works great.

This sort of targeting, being able to adjust the center/crossing/focal point is absolutely what the skill needs. It feels more fluid, more fun and more rewarding than a set range. It’s probably the hardest skillshot in Guild Wars 2, but it is also extremaly enjoyable for me(when it works and arrows don’t dissapear due to terrain). One thing I’d like to see is bonus damage against goes hit by the center/crossing/focal point, rewarding good players.

The idea of “reverse shotgun” sounds good on paper, but in practice it feels awful. Guild Wars 2 combat is not the place for such player skill as you will get to make the best use of it very sporadically, as the focal point is at maximum range. Being able to hit only 2-3 arrows just because you don’t stand far enough is not only clunky, but works against Kalla’s Legend – you will most likely have to go outside of spirits’ radius to land 7 shots.

I wholeheartedly stand by changing Sevenshot targeting to the Instant version for all targeting settings and keeping it that way. The skill together with #5 is the absolute highlight of the weapon right now. It should absolutely be the most damaging skill on the weaponset if you can land a good focal shot (#5 makes it easier). “Fix” it, and the weapon will lose a lot of appeal.

Currently, Aura Slicer (Dagger #2) and Eviscerate (Axe Burst skill) share the animation, at least on female human.

Guild Wars 2 combat is marketed as a dynamic one, where you are supposed to react to animations rather than guessing or looking at bars. Using two same combat animations on one class that can be combined on one build and are vastly different goes against this motto.

Eviscerate is usually the ability you definitely want to dodge, Aura Slicer is not as dangerous. With sharing animations, you are hardly able to read which is which and have to guess, especially if Warrior does them back-to-back, with no autoattacks.

Therefore, animation of Aura Slicer has to be changed not to be a copy of an existing Warrior one.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKR1MONetfA&t=4s

My final opinions on everything Renegade PvP based on my playtime on it in beta. In this video I haven’t dived much into reviewing shortbow, as I did a separate video on it. You can find it here: http://bit.ly/2v3RjJn

For people wondering – I also tested Support Renegade for couple hours (with and without Ventari) and Power Renegade. In the first case, it doesn’t work great and is worse than Support Herald. In the second case, Power Renegade works, but is mostly carried by core aspects of power Revenant – it’s a major downgrade to Power Herald.

Professor Sprout.1560:

The details of a possible implementation for this idea are as follows:

General

• Citadel Orders no longer cost energy to use.
• Citadel Orders consume any stacks of Kalla’s Fervour you had active at the time of use and apply 1 second of “Fatigue” (a new effect) for each stack consumed.
• Fatigue blocks you from generating new stacks of Kalla’s Fervour whilst it is active.

Skills

• F2 Heroic Command: skill now grants you and nearby allies immunity to control effects for 1 second per stack consumed. This isn’t stability – you can’t increase duration via boon duration buffs, it cannot be corrupted and blocking a control effect does not consume stacks of a boon. Increased cooldown e.g. 20 seconds.
• F3 Citadel Bombardment: Projectile radius increases per stack consumed. Damage from all projectiles includes the bonus from the consumed Kalla’s Fervour stacks. Increased cooldown e.g. 40 seconds.
• F4 Orders from Above: Pulses once for each stack consumed. Larger radius from trait now made baseline. Increased cooldown e.g. 30 seconds.

Traits:

• Vindication: might buff unchanged. Citadel Bombardment effect removed. Citadel Orders now break stun.
• Lasting Legacy: Kalla’s Fervour buff unchanged. Citadel Bombardment pulls more missiles into Tyria (flat +5 bonus instead of 1 per stack) over a larger area.
• Rightous Rebel: While you have Fatigue, receive reduced incoming damage from conditions. Orders from Above effect removed. Using a Citadel Order now grants might to nearby allies for each stack of Fervour removed.

I like it, however there’s one minus to the idea – the main appeal of the specialization and the traitline is the damage bonus. Removing it sounds cool, since it’s a trade-off, but I think ultimately it could cause the mechanic not to be used, specifically in PvE.

So here’s an alternative – Keep the Kalla’s Fervour damage buff as it is, gained every time you get Kalla’s Fervour. This splits the damage buff from the mechanic, allowing it to persist and not limiting F2-F4 usage.

Kalla’s Fervour is now a second mini-resource, above the endurance bar, visually similar to Deadeye’s Malice. Fervour behaves similar to Adrenaline, decaying out of combat, caps at 5 and serves as a resource for F2-F4 Renegade skills. Lasting Legacy trait now simply doubles the damage bonus, rather than increasing max stacks to 10.
Alternatively, cap Fervour at 10, but reduce the base bonus to 1%/15 Ferocity per stack.

That would actually be a legitimate change. I love it.

Make consuming Kalla’s Fervour apply a stack/ two stacks of might and we have a solid mechanic.

I’ll also touch on the visuals – I’d like Fervour to be displayed either above the F1-F4 (like on Mesmer’s clone counter) or as points above the Endurance bar (like Deadeye’s Malice)..

Scourge is the strongest Necro has ever been since the original Dhuumfire times.

The kit is basically complete, as Scourge brings it’s own mad condition conversion on low CD (even better than removal), solid Barriers that can easily sustain you in attrition fight, better kiting potential with the new sandwalk+sand swell, amazing access to both melee and ranged fear, unbeatable on-point pressure with Shades you can’t kill, vastly increased Torment damage with traits.

On top of that, Dhuumfire is currently bugged with Desert Shroud (F5) and Path of Corruption is totally bonkers, since it can be activated to hit 5 people + 5 people per shade for 2 corrupts each…every 4 seconds.

Path of Corruption needs some cooldown per target specific to the Scourge (8-10s) and Dhuumfire bugs should be fixed. After that Scourge will still be strong, but maybe not as insane.

It seems like the change works now only with Instant ground targeting enabled. Both other options still use the old version.

Noctis.3426:

yep, it work like li ming arcane missile, It feels incredible now

Are you sure it’s a new change? Have you tried it before with the exact same settings?

Noctis.3426:

I have to say Sb3 with instant cast is much better, i feel like a kitten now.

http://i.imgur.com/H7MaIBE.png

I just hopped in to test Sevenshot and it seems that it behaves the same as it did yesterday.

You will most likely just play the current Condi Rev with mace/axe and Kalla instead of Jalis, spawning the bleed spirit and using maybe the alacrity/Elite/heroic command as an extra.
Shortbow could be on swap, for times when you are forced out of melee for some time. Better than nothing.

To be fair, Renegade could just have the 20% modifier & nothing else and still be viable.

Obtena.7952:

Why are these threads popping up? What is the need for another main hand condi weapon? What would it do that Scepter does not?

New condition mainhand could be useful for pve rotations, since Scourge has no greatsword chill spinning.

But that’s basically it. And Scourge could end up using some other weapon in rotation besides Scepter+Torch/Scepter+Dagger.

Hey,

A quick video, going over my initial impressions after spending an evening+some morning hours testing new Revenant’s weapon coming with Renegade- Shortbow. Comes with a review of the skills and few suggestions on how to make them better.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RwO8KqtPzQk

Tl;dr:

Shortbow is 900 range, contrary to most good ranged weapons, which sit at 1200. Shorter range puts you in more dangerous position than 1200 one would do, yet the weapon provides no extra defense. Even worse, neither new Kalla Legend nor Renegade traits bring that extra defense. As a result, you are left out relying on Core Legends, traits and weapons to survive a dive.

1. Autoattack is decent, great potential with piercing in WvW. Blood Fury (Renegade’s trait) could be bugged, as it doesn’t seem to increase Bleed durations.

2. Second skill on shortbow has nice synergy with traits that require you to strike at the back/from the side. Doesn’t require facing the enemy, which is a welcome and helpful feature.

3. Third skill is buggy on uneven terrain, causing lower number of shots to spawn if some collide with a wall/stairs etc.
It brings no bonus reward for hitting someone with all seven arrows (the centre). I think it’s a missed potential, as some bonus damage could be reward for landing a perfect skillshot.
The crossing point, “centre” is set at max range of shortbow – 900. In regular fight, you very rarely sit at max range, most of the time in PvP you will find yourself somewhere in mid-range while wielding Shortbow. This guts the damage of Sevenshot, as only 2 or 3 arrows will be striking your targets.
Sevenshot is quite hard to land, having not just the requirement of aiming (hitting moving target with the skill’s centre is takes some skill), but also a bit too long cast time.
The skill’s skillshot pattern reminds me of “Arcane Missiles”, Li Ming’s skill from Heroes of the Storm. I think, similary to Arcane Missiles, Sevenshot’s center (the arrow crossing point) should be adjustable so you can fire it closer or further.

4. Fourth skill lacks impact on Revenant. Medium energy cost, about 1s+ total cast time skill applies average damage, both condition & power, as well as Slow. Revenant doesn’t have enough reliable interrupts like Thief or Spellbreaker, no good interrupt traits either, to get a major value out of Slow condition. As a result, Slow is a throwaway bonus.I’d prefer Spiritcrush to be a solid defensive skill, spawning area of denial for Melee attackers, similar to Ward spells from GW1. It also can’t be cast behind character.

5. Fifth skill is very powerful due to shot cooldown, but it could benefit from using a skillshot targeting.

The Elite has an internal cooldown.

Was looking to post it myself.

Every tiniest puddle of water is classified as underwater and prevents all Kalla skills from working.

Juba.8406:

Placeholder trait.

Basically this.

Even if it reactivated on it’s own every 20 or 30 seconds it would be a terrible design and trait. Third interrupt trait to complete the “row” or some damage-focused trait (not necessarily another plain damage modifier) would’ve been welcome in place of Brave Stride.

Current Strength specialization has even less options for such builds. Axe has great synergy with Might Makes Right, but if you are looking for more Axe synergy tou have it in Discipline.

4. Great Fortitude

Why would I change it

• This conversion trait is, from my experience, rarely seen slotted. It tries to increase the defensive potential of Strength line, but a bit more Vitality is rarely the most important thing. If Strength is to be a viable alternative to Defense, for example, as the third specialization in non-core Warrior builds, it has to supply condition-defense mechanisms. When looking at traits in the specialization, Great Fortitude struck me as the perfect place to locate such mechanism. Competing with Forceful Greatsword for Might Makes Right builds, it would remove that easy Might generation tool in favour of more condition removal when chosen.

How does the change work?

• Great Fortitude is not the usual condition removal trait. Instead of removing a condition or two on dodge, it reduces durations of all conditions on you by a flat amount when you successfully dodge an attack.
  It’s a perfect defense mechanism against condition overloads, so present in current PvP, when removing the important conditions is made harder by a lot of cover, not as-important, “trash” conditions. What’s a common theme among many builds applying many conditions is that the conditions themselves are usually quite short and bursty, since players don’t invest into improving their durations in favour of getting more defensive or hybrid stats.
  Therefore, Great Fortitude is a good answer to them, while it’s far less effective against builds that are willing to increase their conditions’ duration. It’s a less “1 or 0” approach to condition removal I would probably like to see in-game in some form.

Synergies

• Traits/effects that generate Endurance. In Strength line it would greatly synergize with Might Makes Right builds and benefit from Building Momentum minor. Vigor.

I tried to make presentation and explanation of each trait as clear as possible for easy reading and feedback. I might do more of such short, well-explained compilations for other areas of Warrior in the future.

Cheers,
Rym

Hey,

As the second balance pass for the expansion is very likely coming, I’d like to give four trait ideas that would make Strength specialization even more so of a viable alternative to Defense by updating or re-working some of them. You can find all suggestion in attachements. Numbers are just to convey the general idea.

1. Restorative Strength:

Why would I change it

• Warrior, especially in specialization loosely-focused on endurance play, could use a way to target-remove Weakness with one of traits. Looking at all options in the specialization, I came to conclusion that the best shot at it would be slightly buffing Restorative Strength. The name of the trait already suggests restoring power, so shrugging off weaknesses and converting them into even more Might certainly fits the theme.

How does the change work?

• Weakness conversion uses the standard condition->boon table, from Contemplation of Purity and other such skills. In this case, Weakness is converted into 3 stacks of Might that last 10 seconds each.

Synergies

• Target-removing Weakness has possible use in setting-up damage bursts. Bonus Might from the skill not only helps with damage, but brings even greater synergy with Might Makes Right trait. Stronger Restorative Strength is an indirect buff to Mending, which happens to be the lowest cooldown heal Warrior has access to and doesn’t mind using on cooldown (unlike Healing Signet).

2. Brave Stride -> Mocking Strikes

Why would I change it

• Brave Stride is one of the newest traits added in the latest balance update, however, without a way to re-activate it during combat it falls into very, very thin niche of traits. Warriors looking for more stability usually look toward other traits.
  The trait slot occupied by Brave Stride could be used to create a complete “line” of adept, master and grandmaster traits focused on interruption and disruption in Strength specialization and that’s what Mocking Strikes brings.

How does the change work?

• Mocking Strikes offers an unique, thematic ability to remove small portions of foes’ Endurance (big theme of the specialization) on your successful interrupts. As an additional reward comes the cooldown reduction. A skilled player could use this trait to lower cooldowns on key weapon skills by planning his interrupts ahead.

Synergies

• Mocking Strikes synergises with my proposition of Body Blow change and helps with general disruption, opressing foes who are not aware. While one interrupt may not be a heavy punishment, a chain of interrupts from the Warrior would put struck foes in a situation when they can no longer easily avoid dangerous telegraphed Warrior’s attacks.
  Because of how cooldown reduction works, Mocking Strikes could also encourage underused utility skills such as Kick, as they would not mess up the more significant cooldown reduction combos like using CC abilities on weapons could.

3. Body Blow

Why would I change it

• Rewards from interrupting foes with Body Blow equipped are currently, in my view, a bit too low. To get the best potential out of the trait Warrior should likely slot weapons that are mainly Power-oriented, such as maces or hammer. Those weapons bring little to none sustained condition pressure, so it’s important for the trait to make the worthwhile impact. Slightly increasing power of the trait is also the answer to ever-widening access to condition removal and/or resistance, added since the initial Specialization patch.

How does the change work?

• The change comes in two parts.
  The first part is lightly increasing the duration of Weakness applied and upping the Bleed application from 2 to 3 stacks, with overall duration reduced from 6 seconds to 5 seconds. These changes make the trait have more immediate impact and value.
  The second part is related to the endurance theme of Strength specialization. If, after interrupting a foe, your endurance is higher than his/hers, the duration of conditions applied with Body Blow is greatly increased. This change provides an extra layer of gameplay and possible optimisation, when keeping up with the power level and staying competitive.

Synergies

• Mocking Strikes, Might makes Right, Signet of Stamina, Building Momentum, Weakness, Vigor. Synergizes with other interrupt-focused effects/traits/skills/utilities as well as ones related to endurance manipulation.

cd.

Klaugh.7415:

Rym.1469:

Mace #4 could remove Protection from struck foes.

Or ANY boon. Warrior doesn’t have a boonstrip, so Mace #4 removing a boon or two would be a wonderful change!

I think reserving boon removal as a whole for Spellbreaker and keeping core warrior without this ability is the way to go, because it increases the appeal of SB in specific situations.

However, target removal that’s thematic to the skill rather than any boon removal still keeps the Spellbreaker’s niche intact, buffs it in a way that conveys the skill’s name and idea and makes it’s functionality more unique. Even though it can’t remove anything, it will remove the one important boon which reduces damage.

My general idea when it comes to GW2 is that more targeted boon and condition removal instead of more general removal would be healthier for the game. It would vastly decrease the value of trash, cover boons/conditions while not nerfing Stability/Fear, for example.

If I were to do it…

Mace #4 could remove Protection from struck foes. “Crushing Blow” crushing all defenses sort of thing. Maybe apply 2-3 more Vulnerability stacks/Weakness when Protection boon is removed.

Mace #5 knockdown duration could be extended for every Vulnerability stack on the target. The mechanic of both MH and OH maces is applying vulnerability, so Tremor could synergize with it.

The trait is one of the few build-defining Grandmasters you can instantly feel effects of. Bring might generation and just meme on the kids. A simple Eviscerate provides a minimum of 40 Endurance, hitting two skills on greatsword refills you endurance in zerg or teamfight – with proper setup blocking will also refill your adrenaline and heal for a lot.

Spellbreaker has 1-2 Might generation on the AA dagger chain with 3/4s total cast time (prob 1s with aftercasts). I can easily see SB dropping Defense specialization entirely because of the stage 1 bursts mediocre value and going SB/Disco/Strength.

Hello,

Just two quick things that in my opinion could help mentioned areas.

Dual Wielding in Arms could use a placement swap with Heightened Focus from Discipline. They are both quite similar in theme, but I feel that in Discipline DW could have a solid pickrate. DW should also likely stack with Quickness, but that’s other thing and probably a bug.

Now, the main suggestion in here will be for main-hand Axe. I attached a tooltip of how I imagine it to work.
As of now, Axe has most of it’s damage (outside of Eviscerate) loaded on the last attack in the AA chain – Triple Chop. I think that we could build on that AA-focused theme further and add some flavour to Axe skills by allowing successful Throw Axes (#3) to instantly skip to the last attack in the chain – mentioned Triple Chop. This would not only improve overall DPS and add something to possible max-damage rotations, but also enable Warrior wielding an axe to have better a engagement. All that when making a simple cripple ability more interesting.

Rym

EDIT: Removed double post, missclicked when editing.

Hitman.5829:

To be honest the spellbreaker looks weak. A warrior is dead meat without endure pain and berserk stance! A warrior is forced to play with those 2 utility skills or else the warrior is easy prey in PvP or WvW.

The new dagger skills have kitteny mobility, the spellbreaker warrior will be easy prey for all the range classes.

I am not surprised!

One of the new Spellbreaker utility skills (Featherfoot Grace) is a decent alternative to Berserker Stance. It’s quite similar to Balanced Stance vs Dolyak Signet – it gives Resistance upfront and a bit less of it, but in return it has half the cooldown, breaks stuns and gives Superspeed.

I’d wait for at least the balance pass before starting with suggestions. We still don’t know any trait, bare one minor.

Executioner’s Scythe damage scalling changed. 2% more damage per 1% missing health. In PvE, the scalling could be even higher, 3,5% for example.

I’d like Reaper to take execution theme up to the next level, generally speaking. Even starting out a bit weaker on high target % hp, but going absolutely crazy when it gets lower. That would potentially give Reaper a good PvE niche for bosses with harder execution phases.

I do actually wonder if outgoing healing % interacts with Barriers in some way.

Anyway, my hope was that the 6 piece would grant noticeable life siphon or boost existing means of it when your Barrier is present on an ally. Or increase the amount of Barrier allies get the lower their HP is.

An emergency barrier is something, but being a pure % hp proc half of the time it will be useful and half of the time it will activate when you’re completly fine. With this hefty cooldown, I see it being useful mostly for stats rather than the effect.

• Move the stunbreak to Inspiring Reinforcement. Or generally somewhere else than Elite.

• Change Vengeful Hammers to be an aura and make hammers purely visual. Currently they behave “physical” causing problems with terrain collision. They don’t need that – nobody is going to be dodging them anyway.

• Hard truth is, functioning defensive builds have access to more invunlnerabilities, evades, blocks. Just look at Glint – it’s the better defensive Legend than Jalis just because of the heal skill. Sneaking in some of that would come with a cost, but may be necessary if we want Jalis to be the defensive Legend.

• Alternatively, Jalis could lean more towards bruiser, with stronger emphasis on retaliatory abilities, more access to Retaliation and better self-heal.

• Maybe it’s just me, but I would like to see Forced Engagement be basically Pudge’s/Stitches’ hook, along with the ability to hook allies away from danger.

Sigmoid.7082:

This is wrong. Damage absorption is, pound for pound, better than healing. Drastically more useful.

Explain this one.

It is a general theme shared across many online games – Shields and Absorbs work better against burst. That’s the same reason why in PvP more often than not Vitality is taken over Toughness (e.g. Mercenary’s Amulet>Destroyer’s Amulet), even in nearly full power metas.

Besides, Shields are less prone to overhealing – but that might not be that true in gw2 due to seemingly low cap on max shield. We will wait and see.

You are getting two new weapons you can freely combine with existing ones, at once. Plus we don’t know what new skins the future will bring.

Actually, wait a second.

I re-watched the official Scourge introduction material and noticed something that might suggest teleporting to Shade locations, if it’s not the new Portal.

https://youtu.be/vV4dyXVjQIQ?t=24s

Here, go frame by frame. Clearly teleporting behind the mob to the second Shade location. Can’t say if it’s the new utility or not, since I don’t recognize animations yet.

There are more traits on current Necro that conflict with Scourge than don’t, so I believe all of this will be adressed in the upcoming balance pass.

I was wondering why didn’t ArenaNet opt to make Shade skills a kit you would swap to. That would make it closer to Shroud and potentially solve some trait issues stated above. We would have 4 skills in the kit, while the first skill could be some sort of low-cooldown skillshot, lowering cooldown of Manifest Shade.

I still have a silent hope that we will get some Shade – Scourge positioning traits (e.g. “After using an utility skill, active Shades send a renewing wave to your location that Regenerates allies and Cripples enemies”) and/or teleporting to /swapping positions with active Shades a la Meepo from DOTA2/HotS Samuro/GW1 Ritualist. The new mechanic is cool, but I think that not putting such traits in the game doesn’t explore the full potential behind the Scourge.

The “mobility” theme we heard of is strangely…not here. We have the portal-lite utility and the thorn-walk, but is that it? I hoped that aspect wouldn’t be just on utility skills we might not even use, but possibly on traits or baseline.

Crinn.7864:

Rym.1469:

Tether has 12s CD so it will probably connect on every second/third burst. If it proves to be too overpowered either the leash range or cooldown can be increased.

It generally looks like a big, middle finger to Thief and Daredevil.

A better change would be it only pulls once then expires. This is a passive trait, it shouldn’t offer more CC than every other CC on the class put together.

I actually assumed that after the pull it breaks. If it doesn’t, then it’s rather hillarious.

Tether has 12s CD so it will probably connect on every second/third burst. If it proves to be too overpowered either the leash range or cooldown can be increased.

It generally looks like a big, middle finger to Thief and Daredevil.

When I heard about the mechanic I expected one of the Grandmasters to allow Scourge to open up some functionality some heroes are known for in MOBA games – particulary clone heroes. That being the ability to teleport to/swap places with one of your clones/Shades.

That extra layer of possible enemy bamboozlement could come in handy in PvP and give another layer of skill to creating and placing those shades.

As for the spec itself, my biggest complaint so far is the Elite. It seems to synergize well with one of the grandmasters – however it’s a rather boring skill for an Elite. Pulsing AoE conditions is nothing innovative, especially after the recent changes to Plague. After seeing what Scourge has to offer, I’d gladly welcome the original Plague, not going to lie.

In general it’s cool, but the Elite skill could be re-made into something more interesting I feel.

Pretty good analysis Methane. This spec might be a bit tricky to evaluate due to all the Shroud removal and third part of our traits being related to Shroud. I expect the balance pass to come before the Open Beta for elite specs starts on 18th, so it may adress these issues.

https://i.imgur.com/bTcuJNnr.jpg

Everything but traits.

It looks quite random, with no one mechanic that ties it all together, not gonna lie. Some might, a bit of alacrity, some lifesteal, some sun spirit that applies bleeds instead of burns. Overall, looks like a lightweight support with some bonus condition damage. It will be a tough sell in WvW if the spawned legend AIs can be killed (since they have to persist in order to do things) and it lacks a defensive skill for PvP. Also, notice the massive Energy costs of the F2-F4 skills, upwards to 40. In general, reminds me of Ritualist – Warband AI members are basically Ghosts.

As for the weapon it looks fairly generic from a mechanical standpoint. Zoning tool, a CC, two standard damage dealing abilities, one which is basically Ranger’s Rapid Fire, but with Torment added. Plus for cleaving AA. Doesn’t seem to have any bigger gameplay theme or mechanics that stand out. The portal thing sounds like a purely visual thing.

Not the best, probably not the worst as a whole. We will have to wait and see the traits.