I play in the Top WvW fight guild on my server. We care not about Points Per Tick, we go around the map looking for orange swords to engage and fight. We Enjoy Combat. On my Reaper I’m generally top 5 DPS in every fight.
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Here are my thoughts on Scourge. Dev’s I hope you are listening, because major changes, possibly a complete overhaul is required. I’m sorry I know you put a lot of work in and I will try to be considerate to this effort.
It is important to understand the difference in WvW from PVE and PVP. The main difference is that Raid bosses hit for 5k once every 3-6 seconds, and in WvW you have 30-60 dudes hitting for 2k 20 times a second. The only way to make it work is constant party support, moving around and dodging bombs while putting out dmg. PvP is similar to WvW but on a smaller scale. You can usually tank the 1-2 players attacking you until an immobility wears off. In WvW if you are immobilized you die.
Quite often with the amount of boons, auras, and healing that allies can put out you are quite sustainable if you don’t stand directly in all the red circles. This, combined with your relatively high toughness from a celestial build, make you pretty durable even with a person or two focusing you. If you eat a full bomb you’re probably dead no matter your class.
The Good :
Scourge Condi DPS is double that of Reaper.
Dhumfire proccing on every F ability – 9 burn stacks instantly on 10 – 15 targets is Over Powered.
Barrier on allies is nice, the Heal alone is great party support mid fight.The Bad:
Scourge has almost zero mobility. In WvW mobility = life.
The Portal is cute, but 3/4 second cast time? Are you kidding?
Scourge Elite is completely useless? If you ignore the copy paste from the other punishments it simply does an aoe Slow, and grants 3 might stacks? Is that a Troll or a Joke? Are you making fun of us?
9-10 burn stacks would have to be on a downed target with Demonic Lore, which was bugged to have no ICD on downed targets. The reality is that once that is fixed Scourge DPS will be significantly lower since you won’t have the inflation from hitting downed targets with massive stacks of burn.
-Scourge also has much higher personal cleanse from F2 and plays a lot different than normal Reaper, they’re not quite as hopelessly slow as you make it seem.
-Portal is fine as is, once groups actually get a chance to play with it I think it will be very useful to simply skip a clash and pop on someone’s backline.
-Scourge elite is fine, though I do wish it had an extra pulse or two.
So In summary necro gives up F1 (Stun Break), 3 (20 Percent Dmg Reduction and 3 Stacks of Stability), 2 ( Instant cast, 6 second cooldown, 600 range invulnerable leap), to gain Overpowered Ranged Condi Spam.
You ruin the Necro experience by making it immobile and unable to play with others due to vulnerability. You ruin everyone elses experience by allowing massive condi spam, which is what is already wrong with WvW in the first place, and you add insult to injury here by making every ability on the bar rip boons.
-None of the top guilds run Soul Reaping on their Celestial Reapers, instead almost all running Spite/Curses/Reaper for the extra damage and boon corruption gained from taking Spite and Curses.
-Losing Infusing Terror sucks but Scourge also does not play melee range in shroud like Reaper does, so it is quite understandable.
-The dash in reaper shroud has a cast time, can be interrupted, and most certainly does not make you invulnerable, however convenient it is.
- Scourge is more than playable as is in zergs, and it is quite effective in doing so while helping allies via barrier and frequent small doses of cleanse and barrier from F2 and F3.
-The boon rip of Scourge is fine, especially when you look at the other new elites’ boon application abilities. Warriors’ new elite skill does significantly more boon rip to 10 targets every half-second while also blocking projectiles in a wide area.
How to fix:
1. Give us a leap, either on torch or fix our portal to 600 range instant cast, instead of 3/4 second cast time interuptable. Also please make the Sand Swell lower cooldown, 28 seconds is way too long, 16 seconds would seem reasonable.
2. Make the large sand shade the default so we don’t have to waste a grand master trait on it. The smaller sand shades should require the trait.
3. Reduce Barrier Decay on the Necromancer. Necro will be heavily focused so give him a usable defense. In WvW we are taking about 280k dmg in a 20 second window, our heal is going to mitigate about 8-9k of that, currently barrier is cute, but it just gets blasted away instantly. Its nothing compared to distort, or shroud.
1. No, torch is fine without mobility (I would only make the #5 skill hit 3 targets if I were to buff it). 16 seconds is far too low a CD on Sand Swell especially if you are traiting Punishments.
2. No, taking the large shade for convenience reduces potential DPS from not taking Demonic Lore, it’s a trade-off and should stay as is.
3. I want barrier to last longer than 2 seconds as well, but as it’s pretty strong. If you are taking 280k damage in 20 seconds you need to stop standing in red circles, simple as that. Distort is a distinct mechanic to Mesmer/Chronomancer and is completely different than the tools we have access to as Scourge and Reaper. Don’t forget Reaper Shroud reduces damage by 50% innately.
